The Divide: Why BEAD funds should go to local service providers

This episode features Kerry Haughan, senior vice president for commercial strategy at Calix, where he leads Calix's funding team in helping broadband providers understand and apply for grants.

We discuss the federal government's $42.5 billion Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) program – including the work Calix is doing internally to prepare its broadband service provider (BSP) customers to participate, and why he's advocating for BEAD funding to go to smaller, more local providers over Tier-1s.

We also discuss the challenges small and local providers might face in participating in BEAD – particularly with the expected demise of the Affordable Connectivity Program (ACP) – as well as possible solutions to some BEAD hurdles, and more.

Here are a few topics covered in this conversation:

Related:Calix boosts US equipment manufacturing for BEAD

For a lightly edited transcript, click the caption button on the podcast player.