Correction: Puerto Rico's AeroNet is a fixed wireless and fiber ISP (see 1711060013).

International Center for Law & Economics representatives offered reasons why the FCC should overturn the 2015 net neutrality rules, in meetings with Chairman Ajit Pai, Commissioner Mike O’Rielly and aides to the other commissioners. “Congress is the proper place for the enactment of fundamentally new telecommunications policy, and ... the Commission should base its regulatory decisions interpreting Congressional directives on carefully considered empirical research and economic modeling,” said a filing in docket 17-108. The 2015 order was “a change in policy improperly initiated by the Commission rather than by Congress,” the group said.

Puerto Rico fixed wireless and fiber ISP AeroNet expects to have service 100 percent restored by early January, President Gino Villarini emailed us Friday. He said the company began re-establishing infrastructure immediately after Hurricane Maria and expects to be 90 percent restored by early December. He said damage was mostly broken antennas, wear damage, and damaged and cut fiber, plus 15 collocated towers fell down. Restoration will cost more than $3 million, he said. Communications network recovery in Puerto Rico has been hampered by lack of electricity (see 1711010012). Villarini said minus the power outage, about 70 percent of its customers would have service Monday, but actually about 50 percent do. He said that for the first four weeks after the hurricane, recovery efforts also were hampered by employee issues. "We had a lot of issues without housing, food and gas," he said, with employees staying at AeroNet facilities and the company providing meals and gas. He said the FCC expedited a company request for special temporary authority to operate backhaul radios in the 5.9 GHz band, with approval in about two days. As of Monday, 48 of 78 counties had more than 50 percent of their cellsites out of service, down from 49 the previous day, according to the FCC's latest Maria status report. It said 47.8 percent of cellsites in Puerto Rico and 38 percent of cellsites in the U.S. Virgin Islands were out. It said two Puerto Rico TV stations and 61 AM and FM radio stations are confirmed or suspected to be off-air.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk is “quite confident” his company can achieve full “human-level autonomy” in self-driving cars with Autopilot “computing hardware,” he said on a Wednesday earnings call. The question is “what will be acceptable to regulators?” he said. “Regulators may require some significant margin above human capability in order for a full autonomy to be engaged,” said Musk. “They may say, ‘It needs to be 50 percent safer, 100 percent safer, 1,000 percent safer,’ I don't know. I'm not sure they know, either.” Tesla will have “more to say on the hardware front soon, we're just not ready to say anything now,” he said. “But I feel very optimistic on that front.” A truck driver’s failure to yield the right of way and the “inattention” of the Tesla Model S driver “due to overreliance on vehicle automation” in the car's Autopilot mode were the “probable cause” of a 2016 crash near Williston, Florida, that killed the Tesla driver, the National Transportation Safety Board reported (see 1709120050).

Crown Castle completed its buy of Lightower's 32,000 route miles of fiber (see 1710050059), the buyer said in a Wednesday news release.

Treating VoIP as an information service is good public policy, said phone, cable and VoIP industry associations in amicus briefs at the 8th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in docket 17-2290. In a joint brief (in Pacer), USTelecom, the Voice on the Net Coalition, AT&T and Verizon supported FCC comments that allowing the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission to regulate VoIP as it seeks to do for Charter Communications would be bad for the market (see 1710300036). “Preemption of state common-carrier, public utility regulation does not give VoIP providers an unfair advantage in the marketplace, but instead puts VoIP providers on an equal footing with wireless providers and over-the-top or nomadic VoIP providers, both of which are exempt from such regulation,” the phone and VoIP providers said. Pre-empting states wouldn’t harm VoIP customers because the FCC "repeatedly held that VoIP providers remain obligated to comply with a robust array of statutory consumer protections, including 911 access, universal service contributions, and accommodations for subscribers with disabilities,” they said. NCTA also urged (in Pacer) the 8th Circuit to uphold the lower court’s ruling that VoIP is an information service. “While the FCC’s light-touch framework has been instrumental to the successful roll-out of VoIP," said the cable association, "the application of state regulations designed for traditional local exchange services … would stymie the competition and innovation Congress and the FCC set out to foster."

Telcos and others filed intercarrier compensation comments in response to an FCC Wireline Bureau public notice seeking to refresh the record on issues growing out of a 2011 Further NPRM (see 1709080046). The comments were filed in docket 01-92 by AT&T, CenturyLink, General Communication, HD Tandem, ITTA, Peerless Network and others, NCTA, Nebraska Rural Independent Companies, NTCA/WTA, South Dakota Network, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon and Voice on the Net Coalition.

Two-thirds of respondents in a recent survey believe consumers aren’t confident in their ability to do complex smart home installations on their own, said a CSG International report Tuesday, based on a survey of 2,000 consumers in the U.S., Australia, Brazil, Malaysia and Mexico. Survey results indicated "professional, technical resources will play a significant role in bridging the gap between consumers and the world of devices around us,” said Chad Dunavant, vice president-product management, CSG, a platform provider for managing field-service operations for pay-TV providers. “There is a clear opportunity for Pay TV providers to evolve the skills of their field service technicians to capitalize on the growing consumer-based IoT market,” said Dunavant. Findings showed most respondents expect to connect home security and monitoring systems (49 percent) and smart home automation devices such as remote light controls and door locks (48 percent) in the next three years, but consumers want help -- both online resources and in-person installation assistance -- for simple and complex connections. Some 84 percent said consumers will want help from a professional to connect two to five devices. Just over half of respondents said finding a reputable company for technical help was their most important criterion, outweighing on-demand access and finding the lowest-cost option, it said.

Cellular company Smith Bagley asked the FCC to limit eligibility for enhanced tribal Lifeline USF support to facilities-based carriers, and NTCA petitioned for near-term wireline relief from new Lifeline minimum service standards. The enhanced support helped Smith Bagley (Cellular One) construct more than 200 cellsites and upgrade its network, said a filing posted Monday in docket 11-42 on meetings with Wireline Bureau staffers and aides to all FCC commissioners other than Jessica Rosenworcel. Allowing resellers to receive enhanced support discourages network investment, said the provider. It also asked the FCC "to carefully calibrate any limitation on enhanced Lifeline that related to population density so as to not exclude Tribal lands whose residents are in difficult circumstances." NTCA asked the FCC to set aside updated Lifeline minimum service standards for fixed, wireline broadband internet access services (BIAS) eligible for support. The agency should "temporarily waive the strict application of the new minimum service speed standard and 'grandfather' existing BIAS customers [with 10/1 Mbps] service, enabling such consumers to continue to receive that service should they so choose," it petitioned. "Because the increase in speed [to 15/2 Mbps] will almost certainly come with an increase in monthly rates that may be unaffordable for some low-income consumers, the updated minimum speed standard could have the unintended consequence of forcing some low-income rural consumers to discontinue their service." NTCA said a long-term solution is needed to help RLECs offer stand-alone, affordable broadband.

Cisco agreed to pay $1.9 billion cash to acquire BroadSoft, a cloud-based unified communications provider for small and medium-sized businesses, Cisco said in a Monday news release. The deal is expected to close in Q1, subject to closing conditions and regulatory review. Cisco has made about 200 acquisitions, said Vice President-Corporate Development Rob Salvagno.