'See Market Realities' by Nixing Dominant Status of Incumbent Telcos, O'Rielly Asks of FCC
Commissioner Mike O'Rielly wants the FCC to "see market realities and eliminate the requirements associated with this supposedly 'dominant' status" of incumbent phone companies, he wrote on the agency's blog Thursday. He said a USTelecom petition seeking a review on…
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the matter that has been pending since December 2012 should be OK'd. "While it is true that incumbents still account for most of the remaining switched access lines, that’s no longer a useful or relevant way of looking at the voice market," as options abound for consumer phone calls, he said. "In 2013, less than one-third of American households purchased an incumbent switched access service, and that figure is projected to drop to under 20 percent by the end of this year." O'Rielly said such trends are shown in the commission's local phone competition reports. "Dust off" USTelecom's "petition and grant some relief," O'Rielly wrote of the association's request for a declaratory ruling to give ILECs relief from dominant-carrier regulation. A commission spokesman declined to comment. USTelecom thinks "the blog is accurate," emailed an association spokeswoman.