[GreenKeys] Bad News for Amateur and Military Radio

[Don Robert House]

Now when you loose power you can also loose internet connectivity and  
telephone service all at once.  Not to mention putting broadband  
interference all over the country.

DirecTV said it would bundle broadband-over-powerline high-speed  
Internet and VoIP with its digital TV services to about 1.8 million  
homes in the Dallas-Forth Worth, Texas region by early 2008.

Benefits of broadband-over-powerline include faster upload and  
download speeds compared to many cable and DSL broadband services: up  
to 10Mb versus 8Mb, according to Current. The broadband service is  
symmetric, which means upload speeds are as fast as download speeds.

Moreover, broadband-over-powerline works via a go-anywhere,  
installation-free modem that's about the size of a regular power  
adapter and plugs into any electrical outlet. It is Ethernet and WiFi  
enabled, which means it can fill in wireless coverage gaps created by  
cable or DSL, said Current VP of corporate development and strategy  
Brendan Herron.

Broadband-over-powerline is an emerging technology that adds a  
communication network on top of an electrical utility backbone that  
supports broadband, VoIP and other applications. Current's broadband- 
over-powerline strategy plays into the smart grid concept, which is  
to give traditional one-way utility networks real-time intelligence  
in order to maximize efficiency. Essentially, the same communications  
layer that sits on top of a power-plant infrastructure to give users  
broadband also transmits electric-usage information back to the  
utility's central office. The Electric Power Research Institute in  
the US predicts that smart grids may reduce power-related  
disturbances in the country by 87%.

Herron said the company can only offer broadband-over-powerline  
services once it has a utility smart-grid deal in place. He said the  
company expects to announce more deals in the US, Europe and Latin  
America in the future, but declined to give specifics.

Currently, the company has just one other US deployment in addition  
to its Dallas network and that's in Cincinnati, Ohio, where it sells  
broadband services directly to customers. Its Cincinnati network is  
an older version of the technology, however, and has just 3Mb maximum  
download and upload data speeds. Herron said DirecTV's service will  
go up to 10Mb.

DirecTV VP of broadband Evan Grayer said the company had not yet  
released what broadband over powerline speeds it will offer  
customers. "The downloads speeds are potentially much better than  
cable," Grayer said.

El Segundo, California-based DirecTV is adopting the technology also  
because of its convenience to the user, he said. It has a non- 
exclusive deal with Current to offer the technology wherever else  
Current builds a network. "We're proving it out," Grayer said said of  
the Dallas network. He said it was too early to say whether it would  
roll out the service elsewhere given the opportunity. He said the  
company currently is looking just at a residential service in Dallas,  
but he did not rule out an SMB or enterprise offering at some future  
point.

DirecTV already offers bundles of TV, broadband and VoIP via  
partnerships with AT&T, Clearwire, Qwest and Verizon.

Current's Herron said some telecommunications companies have  
expressed interest in its broadband-over-powerline technology, but  
more so in Europe than in the US. "We will get out on a market-by- 
market basis," Herron said. "It all depends on the market,  
domestically and internationally."

Privately held Current, which is based in Germantown, Maryland, has  
raised more than $200m in venture capital funding since it launched  
in 2000. Its financial backers include Earthlink, General Electric,  
Google and Hearst. Herron declined to comment on the company's  
financial status or whether it was seeking any additional capital.  
The company has one international office, in Switzerland, and will  
set up additional operations wherever it builds networks, Herron said.