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COMPTELPlus
|
Monday, October 19, 2015
Beka Publishing,
www.bekapublishing.com12
Consolidated Communications Merges with Enventis
COMPTEL PLUS Fall 2015 Business Expo
DAY 1
C
onsolidated Communications Holdings
Inc. and Enventis Corp. (formerly known as
HickoryTech) recently joined forces through
a merger, thus increasing the size and scale of the
Consolidated Communications fiber footprint.
The merger has significantly augmented the
capabilities of Consolidated’s carrier services
team, which is responsible for the wholesale
network and product portfolios. The strength of
the combined resources will help the company
to drive the expansion of access networks in all
regions, thereby increasing
the availability of lit build-
ings, near-net sites and
Ethernet access in CLEC
and ILEC territories.
The combined
company also intercon-
nects withmany local,
regional, national and global
carriers, and leverages its
advanced fiber-optic network
andmultiple data centers to offer a wide range of
communications services, including Ethernet, TDM,
wavelength, colocation and dark fiber.
“This merger combined two companies with
similar strategies and cultures, resulting in a finan-
cially strong company with a robust balance sheet
and attractive dividend payout ratio,” said Bob
Udell, Consolidated’s president and CEO. “Enventis
built a strong business delivering competitive
business and broadband services over a 4,200
route mile fiber network. The combination and
additional markets created a broader platform
from which to grow and expand.”
Formerly headquartered in Mankato, Minn.,
Enventis operates a next-generation fiber network
that enabled facilities-based operations in its home
state, as well as into Iowa, North Dakota, South
Dakota andWisconsin. The company has grown both
revenue and EBITDA at a compound annual growth
rate of approximately five percent since 2006.
Enventis serves more than 1,600 lit buildings,
12,000 near-net sites and 290 fiber-to-the tower
sites, and operates six data centers. Enventis’ network
reach both complements and bolsters Consolidat-
ed’s existing product portfolio and provides denser
network coverage in its northern region.
“Our long-term stability combined with exten-
sive colocations at LEC COs and carrier hotels
in both rural and metro markets, customer-
engineered solutions, dark-fiber availability and
an agile, professional wholesale team allow us to
operate a vast fiber network with unique reach in
key service areas,” said Brian Carr, vice president of
carrier services at Consolidated.
Foundedmore than a century ago, Consolidated
Communications provides advanced communications
services to both residential and business customers
in California, Kansas, Missouri, Illinois, Texas and
Pennsylvania, and itself already offers a wide range of
services over its IP-based network, including local and
long distance telephone, digital phone, high-speed
Internet access and digital TV.
o
1Gbps has led to programmers from across the
country to gather at DevMountain to develop
newWeb and mobile applications. In addition,
the UnitedWay of Utah County has promoted
new digital literacy programs throughout the
community; and one organization, called Now I
Can, has used Google Fiber to remotely connect
parents with their children undergoing intensive
physical therapy in Provo.
Key Trends Shaping Fiber
Deployment
The panelists certainly bring plenty of
perspective to the session. Google Fiber for
instance arguably kicked off the 1Gbps competi-
tion for the home when it announced its plans
to deploy it in Kansas City in 2011. Since then,
several broadband providers have announced
new deployments. In June, AT&T announced
the expansion of its “Gigapower” service to 12
communities, including Charlotte, N.C. And in
the cable sector, the DOCSIS3.1 rollout effort has
been dubbed the “GigaSphere” initiative. Time
Warner Cable notably has embraced the 1Gbps
movement with a $25 million network invest-
ment to support the rollout in Los Angeles and
other major markets.
And indeed, Google Fiber continues to expand
intometro areas, includingmost recently Atlanta;
Charlotte; Nashville, Tenn.; the Raleigh-Durham,
N.C. area; and Salt Lake City. Google is already live
in Austin, Texas; Kansas City, Mo.; and Provo, with
its fiber-fed 1Gbps Internet andTV packages. For
now, the five new cities are in the design phase,
with service turn-ups to be announced. Pricing
plans, if they follow other rollouts, should include a
free basic Internet connection at 5Mbps following a
$300 construction fee, a 1Gbps broadband available
for $70 a month, and a broadband plus TV service
for $120 a month. These are prices that are similar
to European offerings and well below a typical
cable subscription—meaning that the company is
certainly shaking up future business models.
Meanwhile FirstLight continues to grow its
fiber network throughout upstate New York and
northern New England, and several large market-
place trends are guiding its decisions on network
investment and the development of its portfolio.
For instance, it has seen a demand for higher
bandwidth, data-centric solutions, especially
Ethernet. That’s particularly true in the vertical
markets, and especially in the financial and
healthcare sectors.
“Customer demand for Ethernet and IP data
is absolutely one of our biggest drivers, espe-
cially from entities that are data centric but
may have some voice service needs,” CEO Kurt
Van Wagenen said in an interview late last year.
“Some smaller customers are okay with TDM. But
increasingly, the larger enterprises and carriers
are looking for IP.”
A second trend that the company has seen is
the fact that customers, particularly enterprise
customers, are outsourcing more communica-
tions and applications into data centers.
“This is a trend that we expect to continue,”
Van Wagenen said. “Increasingly they have a need
to ensure that equipment is in a highly secure,
managed data center. And we will continue to
ensure that we have sufficient data center inven-
tory in all of our markets.
Meanwhile, very large customers, including wire-
less carriers and the largest enterprises, are increas-
ingly interested in discussing dark fiber and leases,
he added. On the wireless side, there has been a
rapid shift fromTDM based-backhaul from towers
to Ethernet, and increased demand for dark fiber to
macro cells. Also, as small-cell rollouts, which boost
wireless density, are in the initial stages.
“How the network needs to be designed to
support the demand that’s driving long term
evolution is shifting,”Van Wagenen said. “They
need to support not just bandwidth growth
and the filling in of coverage, but also myriad
small cell solutions. And they’re looking for more
predictability around costs in their own networks,
which dark fiber can provide.”
o
(Gigabit Fiber, continued from page 10)