The FCC denied a petition from SBC Communications requesting that Title II common carrier regulations not be applied to IP services -- The petition was denied on procedural grounds rather than as a matter of policy. In February 2004, SBC filed a petition asking the FCC to forbear from applying Title II common carrier regulation to IP Platform Services, which it defined as "those services that enable any customer to send or receive communications in IP format over an IP platform, and the IP platforms on which those services are provided." In this ruling, the FCC reasoned that it would be inappropriate to grant SBC�s petition because it asks the FCC to forbear from enforcing requirements that may not even apply to the facilities and services in question. The FCC has not yet decided the extent to which IP-enabled services are covered by Title II and its implementing rules. Therefore, the FCC cannot forbear from applying rules that have not yet been defined.
Few technology sectors sit as close to the center of gravity in today's artificial intelligence (AI) economy as semiconductor manufacturing. Every AI chip that trains a frontier model, every GPU that powers a data center inference workload, and every power management IC that keeps hyperscaler facilities running traces its origins back to the global Foundry ecosystem. IDC's latest market study throws that reality into sharp relief, projecting that the broadly defined Foundry 2.0 market will surpass $360 billion in 2026, a 17 percent year-over-year gain that would have seemed optimistic even two years ago. For anyone advising boards or investment committees on technology and AI infrastructure strategy, this growth trajectory demands careful consideration. Foundry 2.0 Market Development The umbrella term covers four distinct verticals: pure-play foundry, non-memory integrated device manufacturer (IDM) production, outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT), and photomask fab...