Communication service providers are at a “crucial stage” and need to accelerate their “UnTelco strategies” to take back ownership of the home or “or risk being relegated as marginal players,” said an ABI report. Providers including AT&T, Orange and Verizon should step up activities beyond their traditional offerings to generate revenue growth and take advantage of what ABI sees as an $11.2 billion market opportunity in the smart home by 2022. CSPs are being threatened in a market increasingly driven by Google and Amazon with their smart speakers and security solutions, said ABI analyst Pablo Tomasi, who cited a few CSPs -- Telefonica with Aura, Orange with Djingo, and SK Telecom with Nugu -- that are developing artificial intelligence assistants to support their smart home plays. “To win the smart home, CSPs must take a platform approach,” said Tomasi, crediting Deutsche Telekom and Comcast as market leaders in the CSP space with a platform strategy and ecosystems favoring “freemium” services over traditional bundles. “CSPs should use this mix of essential (e.g., broadband connectivity) and value-added services (e.g., monitored security) to tailor a strategy fine-tuned to customers’ needs and regional dynamic” and not impose their fixed-line business model to the smart home, said Tomasi.
ATIS said its testing validated the ability to mitigate unwanted robocalling through the Internet Engineering Task Force's Stir (Secure Telephone Identify Revisited) protocol combined with the Shaken (Signature-based Handling of Asserted Information Using toKENs) framework developed in an ATIS/SIP Forum joint task force, in a release Tuesday. Shaken and Stir "provide the ability to authenticate, digitally sign and verify calling party numbers to help stop suspicious calls before they reach subscribers." FCC Chairman Ajit Pai accepted the North American Numbering Council recommendations to establish a governance authority overseeing Shaken/Stir use by next May (see 1805140028), and various large telecom providers are adopting the procedures, which target VoIP calls.
The North American Numbering Council will meet Sept. 13 at 9:30 a.m. at the FCC, said a public notice Monday in docket 92-237. "NANC will consider a report from its Numbering Administration Oversight Working Group on the technical requirements to consolidate the services of the North American Numbering Plan Administrator and the Pooling Administrator," said the PN. (The FCC asked NANC to report on combining the contracts for the two administrators). "In addition, the FCC will provide more information on the new Interoperable Video Calling Working Group," said the PN. "The NANC will also continue its discussions on how to modernize and foster more efficient number administration in the United States."
The FCC invited pleadings on Sprint's IP captioned telephone service petitions to reconsider the agency's interim rate cuts for provider compensation and reconsider or clarify its decision to authorize automatic speech recognition technology (see 1807300022 and 1807100066). Oppositions will be due 15 days after publication in the Federal Register, replies 10 days after the opposition deadline, said a Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau public notice Monday in docket 03-123.
The USF contribution factor could rise in Q4 to 19.1 percent from Q3's 17.9 percent of carriers' U.S. interstate and international (long-distance) telecom end user revenue, if projected revenue holds steady, emailed industry consultant Billy Jack Gregg in his quarterly update Thursday. Q3 had a rare projected revenue increase, but "if the long term trend of declining quarterly revenues continues, the USF assessment factor for the fourth quarter will be higher than 19.1%." He said Universal Service Administrative Co. Q4 revenue projections are due at the end of August. Projected USF demand for Q4 is $2.06 billion, $112.3 million more than in Q3, he said.
The FCC Public Safety Bureau said its 911 Reliability Certification System is open for filing annual reliability certifications. The certifications, by covered 911 service providers, are due Oct. 15 and should be filed using the online portal, the bureau said.
Some 65 percent of U.S. broadband households bought at least one CE device last year and own an average 8.6 connected computing, mobile and entertainment devices, reported Parks Associates Thursday. Purchase intent for smart speakers with a personal assistant has increased year over year, reflecting consumer interest in voice-first technologies, which are expected to drive further adoption of smart home devices, said analyst Jennifer Kent.
Revised 911 grant program rules are now effective, says a Federal Register notice set for Friday. The final rule by NTIA and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration revised the grant program rules as a result of the 2012 NG-911 Advancement Act.
The FCC Technological Advisory Council will next meet Sept. 20, said a public notice. It starts at 12:30 p.m. in the Commission Meeting Room.
Cisco will buy Ann Arbor, Michigan-based security company Duo Security for $2.4 billion, said Cisco Thursday. “Duo’s zero-trust authentication and access products integrated with our network, device and cloud security platforms will enable our customers to address the complexity and challenges that stem from multi-and hybrid-cloud environments,” said Cisco Executive Vice President-Networking and Security David Goeckeler.