Kaptivate Analysis of BEAD Exposes the Increasing Hurdles of Fiber Prioritization and Deployment

Kaptivate Analysis of BEAD Exposes the Increasing Hurdles of Fiber Prioritization and Deployment

Blurring BEAD: How the Push for Deployment is Erasing the Path to Adoption analyzes how each state’s initial BEAD proposal evolved into its final submitted version. It offers a useful lens for advocates, implementers, and policymakers tracking how BEAD is taking shape and how technology choices are being framed.

What sets this resource apart is how clearly it documents the sharp rebalancing of the technology conversation during proposal finalization. We found measurable declines in explicit references to fiber deployment across many state plans, alongside a pronounced surge in
mentions of satellite and fixed wireless technologies. Notably, this trend appears even in states that ultimately pursued fiber-dominant strategies,
reflecting the volume of inquiries states were required to address around non-fiber deployment scenarios and reshaping proposal language regardless of final deployment outcomes.

One of the most striking patterns is that references to “rural America” declined by over 75% on average across all state plans. In many cases, targeted rural strategies were replaced with broader, less specific language, raising questions about how deployment priorities, regardless of technology, will translate into durable, high-quality access in the communities BEAD was intended to serve.

Check out the full report at https://kaptivategroup.com/blurring-bead.