Hughes Urges FCC Not to Vary Bid Weights Widely in CAF Fixed Broadband Auction

Hughes Network Systems said the FCC shouldn't widely differentiate the bid weights assigned to broadband performance tiers or heavily penalize high-latency services in the planned Connect America Fund Phase II reverse auction for subsidizing fixed broadband/voice services. Satellite provider pricing data show "if the bidding increment per tier is greater than 10%, and if the penalty for high-latency bids is greater than 10%, satellite providers will not be able to compete, even in the highest-cost areas," Hughes said in a filing Tuesday in docket 10-90. Noting it opposed a fiber provider proposal to attach "excessive weights to fiber-based bids in the Gigabit bidder tier," Hughes said the commission should adopt a bid weighting system that provides a maximum 10 percent credit for 25/3 Mbps service, 20 percent credit for 100/20 Mbps service and 25 percent credit for gigabit service. It said the proposal is consistent with several others in the record and with FCC-stated CAF objectives to allocate support in a way “that is technology-neutral and that balances the objectives of maximizing the number of consumers that will be served with the value of higher speeds, higher usage allowances, and lower latency."