LIRNEasia » Blair Levin

Obama’s Stimulus Plan Includes $6 Billion for Broadband

Chanuka Wattegama — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 03:58:03 +0000

The $825 billion proposal from the Obama transition team and House Democrats includes $6 billion to improve the U.S. broadband infrastructure, which is lacking in many rural and mountainous areas, particularly the West.

There aren’t a lot of details yet on how that $6 billion would be given out, but it doesn’t seem to encompass the tax breaks phone and cable companies were lobbying for. Even so, the wireless industry was cheering Thursday morning because a summary of the spending released by House Democrats calls for the money to be used on “broadband and wireless grants.”

Wireless companies were concerned that the money would be earmarked for cable and phone companies providing fiber to the home.

On Wednesday, an Obama adviser who’s been in charge of the broadband stimulus package indicated that industry and tech expectations about the broadband part of the package had gotten a bit out of control.

“The broadband piece of the Obama agenda is not going to be done solely in the economic recovery package,” said Blair Levin, a telecom analyst and former FCC chief of staff who’s been advising the campaign on how to structure its broadband plan. He was speaking at a tech conference on Capitol Hill.

Read the full article in Wall Street Journal here.

Telecom, Google veterans to Write Obama’s Tech Policy Priorities

Chanuka Wattegama — Thu, 20 Nov 2008 08:15:48 +0000

President-elect Barack Obama has named two telecom industry and policy veterans and a leader of Google’s philanthropy arm to craft the new administration’s high-tech policy priorities.

The policy working group on Technology, Innovation and Government Reform will “develop proposals and plans from the Obama Campaign for action during the Obama-Biden Administration,” according to the president-elect’s transition web site www.change.gov.

The authors of what could be sweeping changes in broadband rules, privacy and government transparency include:

–Blair Levin, a telecom investment analyst at Stifel Nicolaus and former chief of staff to Federal Communications Commission Chairman Reed Hundt. Levin is also seen among a short list of candidates to head the FCC in the new administration.

–Julius Genachowski, former chief counsel to Hundt at the FCC and a member of Obama’s transition team. Genachowski, a former law school classmate of Obama’s and an active and early member of the campaign, has been talked about as a candidate for the nation’s first chief technology officer or FCC chairman. He is venture capitalist, the co-founder of Rock Creek Vetnrues and LaunchBox Digital. Genachowski also served as a senior executive at IAC/InterActiveCorp, where he was head of business operations.

–Sonal Shah heads Google’s philanthronpic arm, Google.org’s global development efforts. Shah has a lengthy resume on international development issues: prior to joining Google she was a vice president at Goldman, Sachs and Co., developing the firm’s environmental policy. She is also the co-founder of Indicorps, a U.S.-based non-profit organization offering one-year fellowships to Indian-Americans to work on development projects in India. Sonal worked at the Department of Treasury from 1995-2002 on various economic issues. She is on the Obama-Biden Transition Project Advisory Board.

The announcement comes amid speculation about who will take the job of national CTO and the FCC. High-tech and telecommunications leaders around the nation are also eager to learn what the job of CTO entails.

Read the full story in Washington Post here.

A whole new way of thinking about mobile handsets

Rohan Samarajiva — Sat, 21 Jul 2007 18:31:27 +0000

True to form, Google is proposing a radical rethink of the entire basis of the wireless industry. And it is putting real money behind its ideas. All that is in the way seems to be the FCC.

Google Pushes for Rules to Aid Wireless Plans – New York Times

“When you go to Best Buy to buy a TV, they don’t ask whether you have cable or satellite,” said Blair Levin, a former F.C.C. official who is now an analyst at Stifel Nicolaus & Company. “When you buy a computer, they don’t ask what kind of Internet service you have, and the computer can run any application or service. That doesn’t exist in the wireless world. That’s where Google wants to go with this auction.”