If you're a local government agency or service providers waiting to see if you're going to get a broadband grant, your wait is about to get a bit longer as the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has decided to begin awarding the grants in December and fund the grants in February. While the agencies initially said they would fund all of the applications received in the first round, they decided to delay the awards because of "the large number of complex applications and the voluminous amount of information the agency needs to review."
In August, the NTIA and the Rural Utilities Service (RUS) revealed that 2,200 applicants applied for the $4 billion of available broadband grants in the first of two funding rounds. The amount of applications called for approximately $28 billion in funding, which is seven times the amount of available funding. Due to the overwhelming amount of requests, the NTIA and RUS say they will release all of the remaining available funding in one versus two separate additional rounds.
For more:
- Network World has this coverage
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