The FCC recently issued a report on wireless industry competition that for the first time in seven years did not declare the sector to be competitive. That of course led to feigned indignation by carriers, who obviously declare every market they service to be a competitive Utopia of the highest order. Of course the reality is that you can’t just count the number of carriers and declare a market competitive, and with all broadband — the level of competition differs drastically depending on urban or rural environments.

According to FCC data, 900,000 rural residents have no wireless access, and 2.5 million only have the choice of one wireless provider. 39% of rural customers can choose from all four of the major operators (T-Mobile, AT&T, Verizon and Sprint). Fortunately, prepaid operators are starting to make things at least relatively interesting in the sector.

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2. Bell Canada, competitive carriers fight over last mile network access
3. FCC Imposes New Wireless Roaming Rules – Carriers Must Provide Nationwide Roaming on ‘Reasonable’ Terms
4. America Movil: Broadband access and wireless boost Q3 results
5. FCC Unable/Unwilling To Conclude Wireless Industry Uncompetitive – Despite their own study that supposedly suggests as much…

Tags: competition, duopoly, FCC, fcc data, sector, service, T-Mobile, Time, UTOPIA, wireless industry competition, wireless provider

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