Comments are due July 7 and replies July 22 on Network Communications International Corp.'s (NCIC) petition for an expedited declaratory ruling, said the FCC Consumer and Governmental Affairs Bureau. NCIC is seeking a ruling "that its use of a one-time informational text message to establish a billing relationship with a called party who does not answer or respond to a collect call from an inmate using NCIC’s inmate calling service (ICS) does not require prior express consent from the called party because: (a) such texts are covered by an exemption granted in response to another ICS provider’s request; (b) the text is initiated by inmate callers and not NCIC; and/or (c) the text is not sent by an automatic telephone dialing system (autodialer)," said a bureau public notice Tuesday in docket 02-278. The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and FCC rules require express prior consent for nonemergency autodialed, prerecorded or artificial-voice calls to wireless phone numbers, said the PN, which noted the commission defines "calls" to include text messages under the TCPA. "NCIC asserts that allowing it to send a follow-up text message without the called party’s prior express consent when an inmate cannot complete a collect call is consistent with the Commission’s established policies that recognize the difficulties ICS providers face to facilitate calls from inmates," the PN said. "Moreover, NCIC claims that its texting protocol is virtually identical to another ICS provider’s calling protocol that the Commission exempted from the TCPA consent requirement."

The FCC proposed an E-rate eligible services list (ESL) for schools and libraries looking at participating in the USF discount program for the funding year starting July 1, 2017. Comments are due July 5, replies July 20, said a Wireline Bureau public notice Friday in docket 13-184. The program supports two types of eligible services: Category One covers services needed to provide broadband connectivity to schools and libraries, and Category Two covers internal connections. "The proposed ESL revises the description of eligible dark fiber service under Category One to read 'Leased Dark Fiber (including dark fiber indefeasible rights of use (IRUs) for a set term).' This revision is intended to further explain the distinction between leased dark fiber and self-provisioned fiber under E-rate program rules," said the PN. Among other possible updates, the PN proposes to include a new explanation on the treatment of connections between multiple buildings of a single school, classifying those located on a single campus as Category Two internal connections and those connecting buildings on separate campuses as Category One connections.

USF eligible telecom carriers and other stakeholders must file FCC Form 481 by July 1 for "carrier annual reporting data" after the Office of Management and Budget approved the form and its instructions Friday, said a Wireline Bureau notice in docket 14-58 listed in Wednesday's Daily Digest.

The next meeting of the North American Numbering Council (NANC) will be June 30 at the FCC, the agency said in a notice Tuesday. The NANC meeting is to start at 10 a.m. EDT and end four hours later.

Platinum Equity agreed to pay $323.4 million cash to acquire Electro Rent, a company that rents, leases and sells servers, PCs and electronic test equipment, they said in a news release Tuesday. The deal, expected to close in 90 to 120 days, requires approval by Electro Rent stockholders and “various regulatory agencies,” they said. Electro Rent will “greatly benefit from additional resources and experience to further enhance our already high inventory, service and support standards,” said CEO Steven Markheim.

The GAO said it's recommending that the White House Office of Management and Budget finalize draft guidance for identifying and prioritizing “legacy” IT systems at federal agencies that need to be modernized or replaced. The GAO said about 75 percent of the federal government's more than $80 billion in IT spending during FY 2015 went to funding IT operations and maintenance. Operations and management spending increased over the previous seven fiscal years, resulting in spending on IT development, modernization and enhancements activities to decline by $7.3 billion between FY 2010 and FY 2017, the GAO said in a report Wednesday. GAO also recommended 13 federal agencies, including the departments of Defense, Justice and Treasury, address at-risk and obsolete investments for IT operations and maintenance.

Vonage backed an FCC order allowing interconnected VoIP providers to obtain phone numbers directly from numbering administrators, a decision NARUC is challenging in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit (NARUC v. FCC, No. 15-1497). NARUC lacks standing to bring its challenge and hasn't shown that the FCC lacks authority to provide interconnected VoIP direct numbering access, intervenor Vonage said in its brief (in Pacer) Thursday. It also said there's no statutory requirement the FCC classify VoIP as a telecom service in order to give interconnected VoIP providers direct numbering access, as NARUC argued (see 1604050013). The FCC defended its order last week (see 1605200002).

A hearing on AT&T's motion to dismiss Herring Networks' complaint about its carriage on U-verse (see 1603110064) is scheduled for June 27 before U.S. District Judge Christina Snyder of Los Angeles. In an opposition filing (in Pacer) Monday, Herring said AT&T's motion to dismiss is "replete with boilerplate arguments" and its claims of fraud, breach of contract and breach of implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing "are all sufficiently pled." The fraud allegedly came when AT&T misrepresented its plan to expand its U-verse platform and concealed its plans to buy DirecTV, the implied covenant claim stemming from AT&T's obligation not to frustrate Herring's rights under the U-verse agreement and the contractual claims coming from the telco's now-breached agreement to put Herring's networks on DirecTV. AT&T, in its motion to dismiss filed last month, said Herring "is essentially asking this Court to rewrite the terms of a contract that it once agreed to, but now apparently regrets," its 2014 agreement with Herring specifically says the programmer has no right to have its content carried on any other video system AT&T might buy, and the contract specifically says the telco has the right to shut down U-verse without recourse to Herring.

The FTC approved Vonage and Oracle acquisitions of cloud companies, in early termination notices Friday. The commission OK’ed Vonage’s $230 million acquisition of Nexmo, a communications platform-as-a-service company. Also, the FTC approved Oracle’s $663 million acquisition of Textura, which provides construction contracts and payment management cloud services. The Vonage deal was announced in a May 5 news release and the Oracle deal was announced in an April 28 news release.

GoDaddy sought FCC approval to transfer FreedomVoice's international Communications Act Section 214 authorization to the domain name registrar as part of GoDaddy's purchase of the cloud-based communications company. GoDaddy said Tuesday it was buying FreedomVoice for $42 million in cash and up to $5 million in “future milestones” payments. FreedomVoice currently holds Section 214 authorization to provide international telecom services between the U.S. and “international points on a facilities and resold basis,” GoDaddy said in Thursday's filing. GoDaddy/FreedomVoice “will serve the public interest by further facilitating the provision of cloud-based communications and other services to small businesses,” GoDaddy said. “This transaction will not impact FreedomVoice's customers, and will be virtually transparent to customers in terms of the service they now receive.”