How to Enter Brand Name Information in the BDC System

To submit broadband availability data to the Broadband Data Collection (BDC) system, you must first enter all of the Brand Names associated with your Entity on the Entity Information Page.  A Brand Name is a “doing-business-as name” for your Entity, or the name you use in marketing your service, and it is how your Entity’s broadband availability will appear on the National Broadband Map. Each record of your availability data must include a Brand Name, and you must enter all of the Brand Names included in those files on the Entity Information page.  Uploading availability data containing a Brand Name that does not match a Brand Name found on the Entity Information Page will result in an error.

Saving Brand Names to the Entity Information Page

Log into the BDC System and navigate to the Entity Information page.  If you have not yet entered a Brand Name, you will be automatically directed to the Entity Information page upon selecting the FRN from the Entity Selection page.  You will be unable to access the Submissions Dashboard until you have added at least one Brand Name.  Once you are on the Entity Information page, select the “Brand Names” tile, as shown below.

Click “Add New” to input a new Brand Name.  A window will pop up, prompting you to enter your Entity’s Brand Names.  Brand Names must be unique – the system will reject duplicate Brand Names based on spelling and case.  Hit either the “Enter” or “Tab” keys once you have entered a Brand Name to add it to the running list in the window, as shown below.  Once you have finished adding every Brand Name associated with your Entity, click on the blue “Save” button to submit the list.  The “Add New Brand Name” window should automatically close upon saving.

The list of Brand Names you entered should now appear in the table below the “Add New” button.  You can delete a Brand Name by clicking the red trash can in the “Action” column.  If you accidentally entered a Brand Name with a typo, you must delete it and input the corrected version using the “Add New” button.

Note: If a Brand Name is entered on the Entity Information page and included in successfully submitted availability data, it cannot be removed from the Entity Information page unless you first delete the availability data file itself.

Once you have saved at least one Brand Name to the Entity Information page, you may navigate to the Submissions Dashboard using the blue “Submissions Dashboard” hyperlink below the Brand Names table.

Managing Brand Names in Availability Data

Broadband service providers must identify a Brand Name for each Broadband Serviceable Location (BSL) or area included in their fixed availability data, and in each mobile broadband and voice availability data file (for information on the specifications for these availability data files, see https://us-fcc.app.box.com/v/bdc-availability-spec).  Every Brand Name in your availability data must match one of the Brand Names saved to your Entity Information page.  The system will reject file uploads that contain unidentified Brand Names, as shown in the screenshot below:

Note: You will be unable to add or delete Brand Names from the Entity Information page while an availability data upload is processing in the system.

If you need to add a Brand Name to the Entity Information page after attempting to upload availability data, you can easily navigate there by clicking the white “Brand Names” button next to the blue “Upload Availability Data” button.

Once you’ve added the new Brand Name, you can return to the Availability Data page by clicking the blue “Availability Data” hyperlink below the Brand Names table.

 Approved Map Display Brand Names

 Brand Names entered by filers will be reviewed by the FCC prior to being published on the National Broadband Map.  Brand Names approved by the FCC will appear in the “Approved Map Display Brand Name” column of the Brand Name table and in the blue “Approved Map Display Brand Names” box above the “Add New” button, as shown below.  Approved Brand Names will typically match the Brand Name entered by the filer. FCC staff have the ability to modify or add Brand Names if necessary.

Note:  FCC Approved Brand Names will first be displayed on the National Broadband Map when the data as of December 31, 2023 is published on the map.

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