The Federal Communications Commission on Friday released its plan to take a fresh look at old regulations so to root out industry mandates that may be inconsistent, redundant, outdated or needlessly impede U.S. global competitiveness and dissuade industry investment.

Genachowski

Part of the administration's Campaign to Cut Waste, the regulatory reform initiative is aimed at making the FCC's rulemaking process more transparent, its regulatory program more effective and industry compliance less burdensome by removing unjustified regulations, streamlining procedures and ridding the FCC of counterproductive requirements that stymie economic growth and innovation.

The Final Plan for Retrospective Analysis of Existing Rules outlines the independent commission's strategy for a prudent and rational regulatory apparatus for the telephone, broadcasting, satellite and wired communications industries the FCC oversees, and keeps with the FCC's charge to protect consumers and ensure a competitive marketplace.

The Final Plan calls for systematic reviews of significant regulations and information-collection requirements to determine if the existing requirements have outlived their usefulness or become unfairly onerous or have unjustified costs.

"Every part of the Commission is involved in efforts to eliminate outdated regulations and to promote private investment and innovation that creates jobs and spurs economic growth," the document reads.

The commission's larger regulatory-reform efforts extend beyond just retrospective review.

The FCC plan indicates that to foster better outcomes in the rulemaking process, there is "early involvement" of the commission's chief economist and FCC staff members consult with the administration's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) on best practices for cost-benefit analyses, for instance.

The FCC rule-lookback plan follows President Barack Obama's nonbinding July 2011 executive order that independent federal agencies--such as the FCC and the Securities and Exchange Commission--join his administration's government-wide campaign against needlessly burdensome industry mandates.

Executive Order 13579 (76 FR 41587) called on independent federal agencies to consider "how best to promote retrospective analysis of rules that may be outmoded, ineffective, insufficient, or excessively burdensome, and to modify, streamline, expand, or repeal them in accordance with what has been learned."

FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, a Democrat, said the Final Plan's release affirms the agency's "extensive efforts" to eliminate unnecessary regulations.

"Our commitment to smart and streamlined government is helping promote a healthy climate for private investment, innovation, and job creation, benefiting all Americans," said Genachowski, a 2009 Obama appointee.

The FCC has long had a statutory-mandated rule-review process. Section 11(a) of the federal Communications Act (Pub.L. 73-416), as amended, requires that every two years the commission consider whether a regulation warrants revision amid changes in technology, research or market structure.

Pai

The law requires the commission "to repeal or modify any regulation it determines to be no longer necessary in the public interest as the result of meaningful economic competition between providers of such service.

Newly minted FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai, a Republican, said the review should neither be done hastily nor in the usual fashion.

"In light of the importance of this comprehensive retrospective analysis, I believe that the 2012 Biennial Review should take the form of Commission-level action rather than bureau-level recommendations," " Pai, a former FCC deputy general counsel, said in a statement.

In its efforts to eliminate unnecessary government mandates on the communications industries, the FCC since 2009 has eliminated 219 regulations.

Among recent FCC streamlining instances noted in the Final Plan:

• Modification of Outage Reporting Requirements: The commission amended outage reporting requirements for interconnected IP-based services, citing new technologies. 
• USF Contribution Reform: On April 27, the commission adopted a proceeding to reform the contribution side of universal service. It requires telecommunications carriers and certain other providers to contribute on the basis of their end-user revenues. 
• Wireless E911 Location Accuracy: In July 2011, the commission proposed measures to improve 911 availability and location determination for users of interconnected VoIP services.    
• IP-based Telecommunications Relay Service (TRS) Technological Standards: The FCC said technological advances have resulted in the migration of the majority of TRS usage from public-switched telephone network services to IP-based services.
• Docket Management: The commission amended its organizational rules to facilitate the termination of 999 dormant dockets. 

The FCC released its Preliminary Plan for Retrospective Analysis of Existing Rules in November 2011. The five-member commission is among some 30 federal agencies and departments that submitted reg-reform plans to the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, following the president's request.

For more:
- see the FCC Final Plan

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Business spending on wireline services will remain essentially flat for years to come, as wireless revenues make modest gains, a newly released telecom market forecast indicates.

The U.S. wireline market "will increase slowly," from revenue of $162.9 billion at the end of 2011, to $167.9 billion by the end of 2016, the Insight Research Corp. report, Telecom Services in Vertical Markets, 2011-2016, forecasts.

If Insight Research's revenue projections hold, the telecom industry's wireline segment will have a lackluster compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of just 0.6 percent. Meanwhile, Insight projected wireless revenues will grow 9.4 percent, to $260.6 billion, over the five-year forecast period.

U.S. businesses, this year, are projected to spend $154 billion for telecommunications services; but, by the end of 2016, revenues will have grown to $184 billion, marking just 4.8 percent growth, Mountain Lakes, N.J.-based Insight said in its report.

Analysts blamed a tepid national economy for the mediocre sector growth they've forecasted.

"In light of the current economic uncertainty, companies are continuing to squeeze more out of what they have on hand, choosing to buy cheaper technology less frequently," the report reads. "This underscores the need for telecommunications carriers to abandon business models dependent on commodity offerings and move toward business models that provide services that cater to specific vertical industry needs."

Insight's research director, Fran Caulfield, said the U.S. telecommunications industry's continued "modest revenue growth" driven by business Internet and mobility solutions.

"As U.S. business activity recovers, employment and network traffic increase," she said. "In parallel, business applications shift to the cloud and end users shift to wireless access, driving higher network and wireless revenues for service providers."    

To help jumpstart sales, the 120-page market forecast suggested the telecom industry eschew horizontal "one-size-fits-all" marketing and embrace solution-selling into vertical markets.

"Vertical marketing can open new doors, tap niche markets, and build customer loyalty," the report said. "When telecom providers focus on vertical market solutions, they move away from the commodity-voice sale and toward higher-margin, value-added services."

What's more, analysts said, the vertical approach to marketing "strengthens customer loyalty" by developing closer links to a customer's core business through product customization and support services such as documentation and training.

"Over the forecast period, an increasing percentage of the business revenue growth will come from enhanced services, often for vertical industries, as telecom providers seek to avoid damaging price competition by positioning their services as value-added solutions rather than commodities," the report reads.

For calculations of their revenue forecasts, Insight said analysts pulled total telecom revenues, divided the sum between the business and the residential markets and then examined driving forces in each of 14 selected vertical industry markets: wholesale trade; financial, insurance, and real estate services; professional business services; and communications.

For more:
- see the release
- see an excerpt

Special Report: Enterprise Communications earnings in the first quarter of 2012

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Onvoy Voice Services is urging the Federal Communications Commission to allow local exchange carriers (LECs) to assess originating access charges on traffic within a carrier's MTA, or major trading area.

Jones

The Minneapolis-based, privately held wholesale-services provider has a pending petition for reconsideration or clarification of the landmark 2011 USF/ICC Transformation Order.  Specifically, Onvoy's petition relates to pre-existing VoIP-PSTN bill-and-keep interconnection agreements.

In a May 15 ex parte presentation to Wireline Competition Bureau staff, the company outlined "technical obstacles" related to implementation of bill-and-keep for intraMTA traffic exchanged between wireline LECs and CMRS providers.

Onvoy counsel Thomas Jones, in an ex parte letter, reiterated a suggested remedy.

"The Commission should permit a wireline LEC to assess originating access charges on intraMTA calls where the wireline LEC originates the call and transmits it to an unaffiliated interexchange carrier which then transmits the call to a CMRS provider for delivery to the called party," wrote Jones, partner in the Communications, Media & Privacy Department at Willkie Farr & Gallagher LLP.

At the presentation with Jones were Onvoy Inc. president Fritz Hendricks and company general counsel Scott Sawyer. The trio met with WCB officials Victoria Goldberg, Randy Clarke and Travis Litman, FCC papers indicate.

Onvoy's petition, filed in December 2011, asks the commission to clarify the default transitional rates adopted in the Universal Service Fund and Intercarrier Compensation (ICC/USF) Reform order do not apply to a LEC that has entered into an interconnection agreement to exchange local and toll VoIP-PSTN traffic on a bill-and-keep basis, even if that agreement contains a change-of-law provision.

The change of law in the order, they argue, ought only apply to carriers that did not have an existing agreement to exchange VoIP-PSTN traffic on a bill-and-keep basis. Moreover, allowing carriers that have been engaging traffic under bill-and-keep to begin charging higher transition default rates undermines the commission's goals, the company said.

"The order clearly permits LECs to assess access changes for the transmission of VoIP traffic despite the face the FCC has not ruled that VoIP is a telecommunications service," the company argued for the petition, adding that the FCC should not bar the collection of tandem switched access charges for calls to and from parties that are not purchasers of "telecommunications services.'"

The FCC Report and Order overhauling ICC/USF rules was published in the Federal Register (76 FR 73830) on Nov. 29, 2011. The rule became effective Dec. 29, 2011.

Onvoy is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Zayo Group Holdings, a Louisville, Colo.-based provider of bandwidth infrastructure and network-neutral colocation and interconnection services.

For more:
- see the petition
- see the ex parte presentation

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Decrying the "exorbitant rates" for telephone calls placed from most state prisons and correctional institutions, a broad coalition of civil-rights groups and conservative leaders called Friday on the Federal Communications Commission to examine the harm caused by interstate prison phone call rates.

Pressing the FCC to protect prisoners and their families from "predatory" fees is an unlikely coalition that includes progressive groups--the ACLU, NAACP, The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights--and national conservative leaders, including American Values president Gary Bauer, the Rev. Lou Sheldon of the Traditional Values Coalition, and Galen Carey of the National Association of Evangelicals.

The coalition, among other consumer protections, seeks an FCC-imposed cap on interstate prison phone call rates. Today, a 15-minute collect call placed from a state correctional institution typically costs $10 to $17, the group wrote in its letter to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, a Democrat.

"We write to you as organizations and individuals that represent a wide variety of views on many issues, but that stand united on the need to reduce the exorbitant rates for telephone calls from prisons," they wrote. "Unreasonably high prison phone rates unjustly punish the families of people who are incarcerated, and contribute to rising recidivism rates by deterring regular telephone contact with family members and loved ones."

In their letter to Genachowski, the signatories urged the five-member FCC to act on the so-called Wright Petition that they said has languished before regulators since November 2003.  The petition seeks a 25-cent per minute cap for collect calls, and no connection fees, as well as a benchmark rate of 20 cents per minute for calls placed using a calling card.

The petition asks the FCC also to bar exclusive inmate calling service agreements and collect call-only restrictions at privately administered prisons, and to require facilities to permit multiple long distance carriers to interconnect with prison telephone systems.

Promulgating consumer protections from predatory phone rates for inmates and their families "is a critical opportunity for the Commission to exert its leadership," the letter argues.

The coalition and other critics argue that the unreasonable prison phone rates harming inmates' families result from most states' requirements that bids for prison telephone service also include an annual commission to the prison operator. Commissions, typically based on a share of phone revenues, are negotiated during the contracting process.

"The costs of the calls are passed on to prisoners' families in the form of higher telephone rates, while the prison reaps the benefit of the extra fees and commissions," the coalition's letter reads. "Thus, prisons have every incentive to choose bids that maximize fees and maximize telephone rates-a clear ‘moral hazard.'"

Six states--Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, Oklahoma and Rhode Island--forego commissions and pass the savings on in lower inmate phone rates. The other 44 states, in 2011, collectively raised $152 million in revenue for prisons from "predatory rates," said Wade Henderson, president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.

The issue of inmate phone tolls came before the FCC in 2001, after Judge Gladys Kessler of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia referred to commissioners a civil-rights lawsuit filed by Martha Wright and 19 other plaintiffs with relatives in state prison.

Filed in February 2000, the class action against Nashville, Tenn.-based private prison operator Corrections Corporation of America (NYSE: CXW) asked the U.S. district court to recoup damages to inmates and families and to nullify phone-service contracts entered into by CCA and several carriers, among other prayers.

After the FCC received the case, the commission issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. That proceeding has been pending before the commission since December 2003, the coalition said.

"[W]e urge you to act quickly to address this problem by capping the charges that can be imposed for interstate prison phone calls," reads their letter to Genachowski.

The lawyer for Wright, who filed the petition and brought forth the underlying litigation, said he's hopeful the FCC--now with its full complement of five commissioners and technology available to carriers--will act on the petition.  

"The plight of the families of inmates paying exorbitant telephone rates to remain in contact with their loved ones has languished at the FCC for more than 10 years," said Lee Petro, of counsel to the Telecommunications & Mass Media Team at Drinker Biddle & Reath LLP.

"With the resolution of other long-pending matters, the recent additions of two new Commissioners, and new technologies developed by the service providers that has decreased their costs of service, prompt action now will give relief to struggling families in these tough economic times," Petro added.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons, which charges significantly lower calling rates that states' facilities, uses its revenue commissions to help bankroll inmate programs and recreation.

In fiscal year 2010, federal prison system charged 6 cents per minute for local calls and 23 cents per minute for long-distance calls. That year, the inmate telephone system generated approximately $74 million in revenue, cost roughly $39 million to operate, and showed a profit of some $34 million, according to a September 2011 Government Accountability Office report (GAO-11-893).

Securus Technologies Inc., which offers communications solutions for the corrections industry, met with FCC officials May 7 and May 17 to discuss, among other regulatory matters, prison calling rates.

A bevy of factors cause inmate-generated collect calls to be more costly than traditional operator-assisted calls, the Dallas-based company told Michael Steffen, legal advisor to Genachowski; Deena Shetler, associate bureau chief of the Wireline Competition Bureau; and Nicholas Alexander, deputy division chief of the WCB Pricing Policy Division.

Particular to prison calls, they said, are costs of bad debt, research and development and site commissions, Securus counsel Stephanie Joyce recounted in an FCC filing.

"Securus explained that site commissions are the product of a public policy decision made by correctional authorities, and in some cases state legislatures, to fund prison operations and inmate welfare funds through the inmate telecommunications system," Joyce, a partner in the telecommunications practice group at Arent Fox, wrote.

In October 1999, the FCC began requiring carriers to disclose the rates consumers will actually pay for phone calls received from prisoners. The rule--Operator Services for Prison Inmate Phones-is codified at 47 C.F.R. § 67.710.

The FCC petition matter is Docket No. 96-128, Petitioner Martha Wright et al., Alternative Rulemaking Proposal.

For more:
- see the coalition letter
- the Securus filings are here and here

More reports are surfacing that Hewlett-Packard Co. (NYSE: HPQ), which is in the midst of its latest restructuring, could cut as many as 30,000 jobs as it struggles to find equilibrium.

Whitman

The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg News, among other media outlets, have reported that sources familiar with the plans said HP CEO Meg Whitman, who in March indicated that cutting jobs could be part of her strategy to reorganize, is looking to reduce HP's 349,600 headcount by about 8 percent.

HP is slated to report its earnings Wednesday after market close.

Whitman, in March, combined the printer and PC group, tweaked the Enterprise business, and said that she couldn't promise there wouldn't be job cuts, as executives continued to try and determine the right course of action for the tech company.

She told employees at the time that, as she tried to determine a course for the company, "everything is on the table."

The company, for the first quarter of 2012, saw revenue slump nearly across the board. Year-over-year sales were down in three of its four major business groups. PC sales slumped 15 percent, printer unit revenue was down 7 percent, and its enterprise server/storage/network (EESN) sales fell 10 percent. The slowdown was widespread with all regions hit.

For Whitman, it was the first full quarter at the helm since replacing Leo Apotheker in September. She became the Palo Alto, Calif.-based company's eighth chief executive since 1999.

During the Q1 earnings call, Whitman said it was key that the company act to stop its revenue decline and to "gain share in every single market."

"I would hope that as we get through 2012, you'll see revenue decline flatten out and as we get into 2013 we'll start to grow," she said. "It depends on how fast we can get after some of these challenges in the business. A lot of this is in our own hands."

Still, she said, a turnaround for a company of the magnitude of HP could take years. "You'll see forward progress," she said at the time. "We've got a journey ahead of us."

For more:
- see this article

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Acme Packet (Nasdaq: APKT) has rolled out a series of new solutions for its session delivery network portfolio aimed at providing a broad range of platforms to its customers.

During its annual Interconnect customer conference, the company introduced new virtualization-based session border controller (SBC) solutions.

The Net-Net Enterprise Session Director-Virtual Machine Edition and the Net-Net Session Director-Virtual Machine Edition "give service providers and enterprises "the flexibility to optimize their network architectures" by installing Acme Packet's software on a dedicated or virtualized server, the company said.

The Bedford, Mass.-based company also demonstrated new capabilities for its session management solution, Net-Net SIP Multimedia Xpress (SMX), which consolidates up to eight IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) functions, and the SBC, into a single solution.

It also introduced its newest platform, the Net-Net 7000.

Consisting of the Acme Packet Net-Net OS installed on a third-party server for high-performance processing, the platform supports Acme Packet's Net-Net Diameter Director and Net-Net Session Router products.

For more:
- see this release

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With only a handful of very small software-defined networks actually in production around the world, most SDN conversations are purely academic. But that hasn't impeded the interest and announcements that seem to be on an accelerated pace in recent weeks and months (see sidebar below). Why the flurry of announcements? The reason is because of the enticing potential of SDNs. Industry Voices

Logitech (Nasdaq: LOGI) division LifeSize this week launched a pair of all-in-one HD videoconferencing options aimed at the expanding market of companies looking for mid-priced, high-performance solutions.

Both make set up easy by integrating video, audio and presentation capabilities, and both use LifeSize video technology as their engines, the company said.

The Unity 50 is a 720p30 tabletop or wall-mounted solution, that features a 24-inch LED display. It requires only two cables for plug-and-play setup, and lists for $3,999.

The Unity 500, which is targeted as a more immersive solution, features 1080p30 HD video on a 40-inch LED display. It, too, needs no tools to set up. List price is $19,999.

"Businesses need to speed decision making and improve productivity across the entire organization," said Michael Helmbrecht, vice president and general manager of video solutions at LifeSize. "We are making HD videoconferencing easier than ever to bring to every home office, executive office or conference room."

Both products are immediately available.

The videoconferencing segment is sizzling. A new report from CompTIA said that it's one of the more widely adopted and anticipated elements of unified communications. Some 71 percent of companies have some form of videoconferencing in place, with another 16 percent planning to add it over the next year.

For more:
- see this release

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Comcast and Skype on Wednesday announced that the partnership they debuted last June at The Cable Show in Chicago finally was bearing fruit.

The cable operator said it's now offering customers in Boston and Seattle a new service, Skype on Xfinity, which will allow users to make and receive video calls on their television sets, in high definition, for $9.95 a month, as long as they're also a Comcast Triple Play subscriber.

Comcast said it plans, by the end of the week, to roll out in eight additional markets--Atlanta, Augusta, Ga.; Chicago; Detroit; Harrisburg, Pa.; Indianapolis; Miami; and Pittsburgh, Pa.--before launching in additional markets this summer.

The service will be delivered to the Comcast customer's HDTV through a kit that includes an adaptor box, a high-quality video camera and a remote control that enables customers to IM on Skype as well as control the volume of their television.

For Skype-to-Skype calls or instant messages, the other calling party does not need any special equipment beyond what is needed to use Skype; they simply need to be logged into their Skype account.

At first blush, it's an appealing option. Comcast has more than 22 million subscribers, a nice pool for Skype to play in. And, many of them likely have little experience with video calling, so it seems like low-hanging fruit, right?

But there's the rub.

Those subscribers have been an antsy bunch. Comcast saw its 20th straight quarter of video subscriber declines this month, losing 37,000 customers.

The reason for those losses most often cited by Comcast executive has been consumer concerns with their own economic situation, with a lousy housing market, and just a general angst about the economy.

There also, however, have been numerous reports that pointed to consumer irritation at the rising price of cable services as a primary cause of that erosion.

So, while the Skype to Xfinity service is an interesting addition to Comcast's palette, the bigger question has to be, will consumers be wiling to shell out and additional $120 a year for a service they can get for free on their desktop and laptop computers? One that's far handier--and mobile--on their tablets and smartphones? And a service that is more private and intimate on those devices as well?

Users already will be high-speed Internet subscribers, after all. They have to be. Is having the service available through your TV a big enough differentiator to make the service truly appealing to a sizeable piece of Comcast's market?

Especially when, in addition to Skype, there are literally dozens of other free alternatives available?

I travel often, and I use Skype, FaceTime, Tango and a couple of other services to keep in touch with the home base.

While at home, I use those same services with my 27-inch HD monitor, an affordable Logitech webcam, and a set of earbuds so my conversation remains private. And, if I want more advanced camera and audio options there are plenty of them available, too.

The price per month? Zero. Nada.

If I need a more robust service, I can rent one, literally, by the day or longer term... for about the same price as Comcast's new offering.

There's just too much disruptive technology on the market, and on the horizon, to see this play as one that should be taken seriously.

The Comcast/Skype pairing was far more appealing last June when it was first announced, before they put a price on this lemon.--Jim

Enterprise IT departments are finding that there may be more benefits than detriments to allowing employees to use their own mobile devices at work. A Cisco (Nasdaq: CSCO) study found "quantifiable benefits," as well as complexities associated with the "bring your own device" trend that has swept corporate America.

A whopping 95 percent of respondents to the Cisco IBSG Horizons Study said their organizations allowed employee-owned devices in the workplace, and 84 percent said they provided some level of support for the device.

The report also predicted that knowledge workers will own 3.3 connected devices-from laptops to tablets and smartphones--each by 2014, up from 2.8 in 2012.

The survey, which polled some 600 IT and business leaders, found pro-BYOD policies produced two major benefits, "improved employee productivity (more opportunities to collaborate) and greater job satisfaction."

Nevertheless, the trend can still be worrisome. IT departments are most concerned about security and privacy issues, and about the burden of supporting multiple mobile platforms.

From an employee standpoint, the survey suggests that workers want the flexibility to use their own applications at work for access to social networks, cloud-based email and instant messaging.

The report also said that Cisco workers spent an average of $600 out of pocket for devices that allowed them to improve their work experience.

For more:
- see this release

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