TechNet Hails Governor Schwarzenegger's Bold and Innovative New Broadband Strategy
San Francisco, CA - October 27, 2006 - TechNet, the bipartisan political network of CEOs that promotes the growth of the innovation economy, today hailed Governor's Schwarzenegger's announcement of a visionary broadband strategy to strengthen California's position as a global technology and innovation economic leader.
"Broadband is critical to our ability to create new industries and jobs in California, and the Governor's work is instrumental to keeping us on the cutting edge of the world economy" said Laura Ipsen, Vice President, Global Policy and Government Affairs for Cisco, the worldwide leader in networking for the Internet that employs 18,000 Californians. "For Californians, broadband means improved and efficient health care, the promise of a more flexible workplace and expanded educational opportunities."
"By reducing the barriers to entry for new broadband deployment, the Governor's proposals will help invigorate facilities-based competition, the key driver for deploying new technologies and delivering consumers lower prices and better service in more locations" said Milo Medin, founder of @Home Network and now Founder and Chief Technical Officer of M2Z Networks, a new Silicon Valley backed broadband startup. "Including conduit in new road construction, for example, can lower the cost of deploying fiber by as much as 90% compared to the cost of digging up streets repeatedly and disrupting traffic. This Governor realizes that the definition of infrastructure is more than just roads and highways, and that broadband networks fuel the engine of electronic commerce and are a key ingredient of jobs of the future in California."
"Broadband means jobs for Californians," said Bryan Martin, Chief Executive Officer of 8x8, Inc. a Santa Clara-based company that provides unlimited nationwide Internet telephone service business and residential customers. "Our company depends upon broadband and an open Internet. Our company helped create a new industry - and 200 new California jobs - but to create new services and better products, we will need better broadband in California. This is exactly the kind of thinking we need."
"This order provides a coherent plan for promoting the deployment of broadband networks across the state of California. By reducing regulatory barriers, it will drive deployment and adoption of broadband, benefiting first responders, consumers and enterprises," said Michael Howse, President and Chief Executive Officer of PacketHop. "PacketHop, as a provider of Wi-Fi mobile-mesh networks, is excited that Governor Schwarzenegger is working to keep our state on the cutting edge by making deployment of next-generation broadband networks a priority."
The United States, once one of the world's leaders in broadband penetration, has seen its relative position slip from 4th to 12th globally. In countries like Japan, consumers can now get broadband service with connection speeds as high as 100 megabits per second for under $40 per month, even as U.S. consumers pay comparable amounts for 1 or 2 megabit links that are 50 times slower.
TechNet has long supported policies to encourage facilities-based competition and promote broadband deployment. In 2003, TechNet published a study of the broadband policies of each state, ranking California 14th because of a lack of coherent planning and burdensome regulatory barriers. "California was in danger of becoming a broadband backwater", said Jim Hawley, Vice President of TechNet and the organization's California Director. "TechNet was pleased by the Governor's reference to expanding digital highways in this year's State of the State address and his push for legislation that will help identify communities that need help getting broadband. Today's action brings all of this together and represents a long-term commitment to strengthen California's technology leadership."
Broadband – the capacity to receive and transmit digital content at high speeds with an "always on" Internet connection - is a critical pillar of the information economy and a foundation on which new companies and entire industries will be created and expanded. According to a Gartner study for the Corporation of Education Network Initiatives in California (CENIC), the improved communication and increased efficiencies resulting from the widespread adoption of next generation broadband in California could increase incremental gross domestic product by $376 billion over 10 years and create hundreds of thousands of new jobs.
About TechNet
TechNet is the national, bipartisan network of CEOs that promotes the growth of technology industries and the economy by building long-term relationships between technology leaders and policymakers and by advocating a targeted policy agenda. TechNet's members represent more than one million employees in the fields of information technology, biotechnology, e-commerce and finance. TechNet has offices in Washington, DC, Palo Alto, Seattle, Boston, Austin, Sacramento and Orange County (California). Web address: www.technet.org.
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