May launch the hilltowns
The need for high-speed internet service in homes more critical as pandemic drags on
Hilltowns residents are being told that Elon Musk, the outspoken inventor and technology investor who started Tesla and Spacex wants to help them speed up their participation in the digital age.
Spacex recently won $886 million in subsidies from the Federal Communications Commission to build out its satellite internet broadcast system called Starlink to 642,925 new potential customers in 35 states, including New York.
While Musk talks about sending astronauts to Mars via Spacex, much of the company's current missions are designed to launch satellites that will power the Startlink service, which is being marketed as a low-cost, high-speed internet service for the masses, especially attractive in rural areas that traditional cable TV providers like Spectrum and Verizon have avoided due to the high cost of building in such sparsely settled, remote areas.
The need for high-speed internet services has been rising among the public for years now, but with the COVID-19 pandemic forcing both students and their parents to work from home under government mandate, the need for reliable, affordable high-speed internet is more important than ever to the public.
“The start of a new administration overseeing the FCC and the entrance of new next-generation service provider Spacex
here could combine to bring cutting-edge broadband tech
nology to our region,” U.S. Rep. Paul Tonko, D-amsterdam, said
after the results of the FCC auction were recently made public. "I remain optimistic but I will not be satisfied, nor will I stop this fight, until every person in our region and every community throughout our nation has access to this fundamental tool for education, health, commerce and so much more.”
The results of the FCC auction, known as the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund Phase I, highlight just how expensive building out broadband internet service can be. For instance, the FCC allocated $980,000 in the Capital Region to bring highspeed internet to less than 500 households and businesses. That's $2,000 per customer. Both Spacex and regional providers like Frontier Communications put in winning bids.
The largest deployment will be in Montgomery County, where $460,000 was awarded to expand to 328 addresses.
Spacex won a total of $99 million from the FCC to bring its Starlink satellite internet service to New York state through a reverse auction bidding process in which companies promised to offer a certain level of high-speed internet service in rural and hard-toreach areas of the country at a specified price. The FCC said it saved $6 billion by using the reverse-auction format, only giving out $9.2 billion out of its $16 billion budget for the auction. That means when the next auction takes place, there will be a total of $11.2 billion available.
Of course, building out cable TV networks is expensive, especially land line installations which can cost a cable TV company $20,000 to extend its network by just a mile.
The alterative satellite internet services that are offered in rural areas are expensive and usually fall short of the speeds offered in urban areas where the network has already been built out by companies like Spectrum and Verizon.
It's unclear just how fast or expensive Spacex's Starlink service will be. Customers participating in an early test of the Starlink service pay $99 a month as well as an upfront equipment fee of $499. The FCC said Spacex will offer above average service for the target areas —places like Westerlo and Berne in the Hilltowns, with estimated download speeds of 100 megabits per second.
As a comparison, Charter Communication's Spectrum service said it recently upgraded its standard internet speeds nationwide from 100 mbps to 200 mbps, a major leap that will cover 75 percent of its customers.
That means that the Spacex download speeds, which could exceed 100 mbps, are very competitive with existing services in urban areas.
Spectrum's internet prices are about half that of Spacex, although Spacex officials did not respond to a request for comment about whether it would change its pricing for new customers it has reached due to the FCC subsidies.
But Tonko, who helped push New York state into the FCC auction after the Trump administration sought to keep the Empire State from getting any of the awards, said he will make sure the Spacex service will be reliable and affordable.
“I called the FCC Chairman (Ajit Pai) myself, and teamed up with my colleagues on both sides of the aisle and together we were able to stop this misguided attempt,” Tonko said. “I am delighted that our efforts have now delivered a nearly $100 million investment to expand rural broadband in areas in our region and across the state where, even today, families and businesses have historically been left behind.”
The alterative satellite internet services that are offered in rural areas are expensive and usually fall short of the speeds offered in urban areas where the network has already been built out by companies like Spectrum and Verizon.