Routers for BEAD-funded broadband builds

Buy America (BABA)

BABA applies to every BEAD project. The Commerce waiver for BEAD is in effect from 22 February 2024 to 22 February 2029. It waives the Buy America preference for electronics, including routers and switches. The waiver does not cover four categories: OLTs and remote OLTs, OLT line cards, subscriber-facing optic pluggables, and standalone ONTs and ONUs.

No manufacturer letter for waived routers. NTIA's certification letters and the Commerce self-certification list cover equipment in those four categories that is made in the United States. NTIA states that a letter is not needed for waived equipment.

Report waived electronics on NTIA's tracker. For each finished waived product, subgrantees list its manufacturer, category (for example, router or switch), 10-digit HS code, product identifier, a plain description of its function, country of origin, and quantity. They share the tracker with their Eligible Entity, the state or territory broadband office.

Sources: Commerce BEAD BABA waiver, NTIA BABA compliance and reporting requirements, October 2025, NTIA BEAD FAQ v17

Covered equipment

BEAD funds, including the non-federal match, cannot buy or support communications equipment covered by the Secure and Trusted Communications Networks Act (47 U.S.C. 1608) or 2 CFR 200.216.

Source: BEAD General Terms and Conditions, Nov 2025

Cybersecurity and supply chain plans

Before funds flow, a subgrantee attests to a cybersecurity risk management plan that reflects the NIST Cybersecurity Framework and Executive Order 14028, and a supply chain risk management plan based on NISTIR 8276 and NIST SP 800-161.

OcNOS-SP capabilities that support the plan, on every OcNOS-SP platform:

• TACACS+ and RADIUS for administrator access
• NETCONF over SSH or TLS, and gNMI over TLS, for management
• RPKI: BGP rejects routes whose origin validates as invalid
• Access control lists on management, VTY and loopback interfaces

IP Infusion is registered to TL 9000, the telecom quality management standard.

Sources: BEAD NOFO, section IV.C.2.c.vi, Matriz de funciones OcNOS

Performance and reliability targets

A BEAD network must deliver at least 100 Mbps down and 20 Mbps up, keep 95 percent of latency measurements at or below 100 ms round trip, and average no more than 48 hours of outage in any 365 days.

OcNOS-SP features for these targets: TI-LFA moves traffic to a precomputed backup path on SR-MPLS, BFD detects a failed link, EVPN multihoming dual-homes the access, and VRRP backs up the gateway.

Sources: BEAD NOFO, section IV.C.2.a, broadband aggregation

Room to grow

NTIA's 2025 notice defines a priority project as one that can easily scale speeds over time and support 5G and later wireless technologies. OcNOS-SP is the same software on routers from 32 Gbps to 14.4 Tbps, so a site can move to a larger router and keep its configuration model and operations. Seven of them, from 800 Gbps to 14.4 Tbps, carry 400G ZR/ZR+ optics.

Source: BEAD Restructuring Policy Notice, June 2025

Support, RMA and how to buy

OcNOS Systems ship with one support contract covering software, hardware, optics and RMA, with priority 1 response times down to 30 minutes depending on the support tier. Buy through partners such as RocNet Supply and Netceed, or from IP Infusion directly.

More: OcNOS Systems, support, how to buy