NRTC announced the signing of a master reseller service agreement with SecurityCoverage. NRTC will offer a suite of managed computer protection services, including SecurityCoverage's SecureIT, SecureIT Live, SecureIT Plus and PC Support Services. NRTC members will be able to begin marketing the services on July 1st

Embarq announced that they will become a reseller of HughesNet, a broadband satellite service of Hughes Network Systems. Embarq intends to target business customers with the broadband satellite service. They will offer download speeds ranging from 700 Kbps to 2Mbps and a price range of $59.99 per month to $179.99 per month. Embarq joins Wal-Mart who has also signed on to resell HughesNet. HughesNet competes mainly with WildBlue, a Colorado based satellite broadband provider. WildBlue has NRTC and AT&T as distribution partners.

Satellite broadband represents an interesting business. It targets rural areas that have limited to no broadband access. It’s priced somewhat higher than other broadband options, and generally includes significant equipment and installation costs (when compared with other broadband options). That might explain a recent report by SNL Kagan, featured in today’s Sky Report, which says satellite broadband is struggling somewhat. SNL Kagan reports that satellite broadband has only achieved a 6.2% penetration of the 10.8 million rural satellite broadband household footprint. That represents about 670K subscribers’ total. These numbers are relative though. If you talk to WildBlue, those somewhat low numbers have more to do with challenges of keeping up with demand than with a poor business model. WildBlue has had the unfortunate challenge in the past of having to selectively retard new subscriber acquisition, because their satellites (or certain "beams") have reached capacity, and simply can’t serve any new customers. It looks like they may now have some competitive company trying to meet that capacity challenge.

NRTC announced three new telcos who have signed up for IP-Prime at the TelcoTV Conference. CenCom, Inc., of Jackson, NE, the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Telephone Authority of Eagle Butte, SD, and Home Communications, Inc., of Galva, KS were all named as the latest IP-Prime service providers. Launch timelines were not announced. NRTC has partnered with SES AMERICOM and NTCA to distribute IP-Prime throughout the rural telco sector.

NRTC and NTCA formally unveiled their SES AMERICOM powered IP Prime product today at the NTCA Fall Conference. IP Prime is a centralized end to end IPTV network, targeting small telcos with a managed IPTV network. North Central Telephone Cooperative of Lafayette, TN was named as the first IP Prime non-beta customer. IP Prime has been in trials with several telcos, including West Kentucky Rural Telephone of Mayfield, KY and BEK Communications of Steele, ND. The NRTC/NTCA partnership will also be marketing a programming rights package for telcos who utilize a non-IP Prime IPTV platform.

IP Prime has garnered much interest among the IOC sector. IP Prime is joined by Avail Media and Falcon Communications, all of whom are targeting the rural telecom sector with a managed MPEG-4 IPTV platform. All of these solutions should stimulate the IPTV market in the U.S., and we may soon see numerous telcos launch IPTV service in the coming months. Many of these telcos have been standing on the sideline, waiting for these managed platforms to become available. These developments should further stimulate an already active rural competitive landscape, empowering telcos to compete with rural cable operators and national DBS providers.

There’s a new HITS kid on the block – a partnership between Antenna Technology Communications Inc. (ATCi) and Digisoft. ATCI and Digisoft join NRTC, Avail Media, and Falcon Communications with an end-to end IPTV solution targeting rural telcos. This new solution an IPTV video headend, which utilizes a Simulsat receive multibeam antenna, a satellite subsystem and MPEG-4 compression. Digisoft provides an application server and Java powered set top boxes with program guide.