Ericsson said Friday it completed the sale of U.S.-based subsidiary iconectiv to Koch Equity Development for $1 billion. The deal was announced a year ago (see 2408190017). Iconectiv serves more than 5,000 customers across various sectors “as a leading provider in number portability solutions, and a provider of core network and operations management, numbering and data exchange services,” Ericsson said. The company picked up iconectiv in 2012 when it bought Telcordia.
Comments are due Sept. 22, replies Oct. 21, in docket 17-169 on the FCC’s NPRM seeking input on updates to its slamming and truth-in-billing rules, according to a Federal Register notice released Thursday (see 2507240055). The NPRM was unanimously approved at the July FCC meeting, but Commissioner Anna Gomez said then that any updates should preserve consumer protection measures. Chairman Brendan Carr said at the meeting that while the agency has heard concerns that the rules impose unnecessary burdens on companies, it has received zero complaints about slamming in 2025.
The FCC is seeking nominations by Oct. 20 for six positions on the Universal Service Administrative Co. board, said a Thursday notice from the Wireline Bureau. Those positions, which have three-year terms, are representatives for commercial mobile radio service providers, incumbent local exchange carriers, cable providers, state consumer advocates, and libraries and schools participating in the USF.
AI-generated robocalls are eroding trust in sales calls and will mean fewer jobs for human callers, Aidan Snee, CEO of marketing company Inside Sales Solutions, said in a filing posted Tuesday in docket 23-62. “While innovation in communications is important,” synthetic voice calls “are already eroding public trust in the phone as a channel,” Snee said. “If consumers cannot distinguish between a legitimate human call and an AI robocall, they will increasingly ignore all calls -- harming not only consumers, but also the many businesses that rely on responsible outreach to drive growth,” he said.
The BEAD program "could still get very messy before it's done," wrote CCG Consulting President Doug Dawson in a Monday blog (see 2508140057). With Starlink objecting to Virginia's BEAD awards, Dawson said it's unclear whether NTIA will agree with Starlink that it should have received the $60 million it requested instead of $3.26 million the state awarded. Starlink and Project Kuiper won a combined 9.4% of BEAD locations in Virginia, while the overwhelming majority went to either fiber or cable TV. "We'll have to wait to see how NTIA reacts to the Starlink comments," Dawson said, noting the company said the $60 million would cover almost every eligible location in the state. NTIA "has the flexibility to agree with or ignore Starlink," he said, and the agency "could decide which fiber grants to undo, but it would more likely pass the issue back to the state."
The FCC should focus on both affordability and availability in its Telecom Act Section 706 reports, the Broadband Council said in comments posted Wednesday in docket 25-223. Commissioners approved a notice of inquiry 3-0 last week, with initial comments due Sept. 8 (see 2508080046). “Availability can only be realized by adoption,” the council said. "Serving a banquet to a family with no teeth has not fed the hungry. If the household does not have the ability, for whatever reason, to adopt the broadband service, the fact that it is available is immaterial.”
The FCC should require trade associations to provide “actual evidence” when they accuse local governments of obstructing broadband development, said the Minnesota Association of Community Telecommunications Administrators in an ex parte letter posted Wednesday in docket 17-84. The agency should require filers to include the names of all jurisdictions cited and provide notice to all named jurisdictions to allow them to respond, the group said. Filings that don’t include such information shouldn’t be considered, it added. “Relying on such unfounded claims results in poor public policy.” FCC rules “must be based on reality, not fallacy. This requires the opportunity for parties to respond to allegations asserted in the record.”
Somos representatives met with FCC staff on “the next steps” that the telecom industry can take to combat unwanted robocalls, said a filing this week in docket 17-59. Somos discussed how standards can be advanced “to ensure end-to-end verification of calls which would allow enterprises, and possibly later individuals, to exercise the Right to Use (RTU) their name, phone number, logo, and other identifying information, while making sure that those not authorized to use that information are prevented from doing so.”
Telephone Consumer Protection Act lawyer Eric Troutman on Tuesday labeled last week’s FCC Enforcement Bureau order removing 185 noncompliant voice service providers from the Robocall Mitigation Database (see 2508060041) a “massacre.” The order was “insane,” Troutman said. “This means the FCC literally just shut down 185 telecom companies with a flick of the wrist. … Short and sweet and fatal.”
The FCC Public Safety Bureau announced Monday that the agency's 911 reliability certification system is open for filing annual certifications, which are due Oct. 15. All covered service providers "must annually certify as to their compliance with circuit auditing, backup power, and network monitoring reliability measures,” the bureau said. “If a CSP does not conform to the elements of any of these reliability measures, the CSP must certify [as] to reasonable alternative reliability measures or explain why the requirements do not apply to its network as appropriate.”