Written by Jeff Owen | Aug 17, 2015 4:00:00 AM
Company honored for collaboration with ADTRAN on nation’s only statewide ultra-fast 1 Gbps Fiber to the Home consumer broadband Internet access initiative
Huntsville, AL (August 14, 2015) – C Spire’s ultra-high speed 1 Gbps (Gigabit per second) Fiber to the Home Internet technology initiative in Mississippi has received the 2015 Global Telecoms Business Innovation Award for creative use of high-speed broadband network infrastructure. C Spire executives were honored Thursday during a special awards ceremony attended by technology writers, industry analysts and telecommunications service providers at the 2015 Broadband and Business Solutions Summit hosted at ADTRAN’s Huntsville, Alabama corporate headquarters. The Mississippi-based diversified telecommunications and technology services company was selected for the award by Global Telecoms Business, a London-based magazine and that covers news, trends and technology developments among telecommunications providers worldwide. ADTRAN, a leading global provider of networking and communications equipment, is partnering with C Spire on its Mississippi technology initiative and nominated the company for the prestigious award. “Gigabit infrastructure is creating a new foundation for today’s digital economy and C Spire is leading the way with its unique public-private partnership in communities across the Magnolia state,” said Jay Wilson, senior vice president of technology and strategy for ADTRAN. Wilson said C Spire’s program is getting a lot of attention, but few are aware of the creativity and innovation that were the genesis of the historic technology infrastructure initiative. “Essentially, C Spire decided to expand the fiber optic cable infrastructure that supports its wireless network operations to create a whole new line of business and chart a new economic future for Mississippi.” In the last 18 months, the company has deployed nearly 2,000 route miles of new fiber optic cable across the state, adding to its already extensive inventory of 4,000 route miles. With thousands of consumers signing up for the service, C Spire has rolled out ultra-fast Gigabit speed Internet access, super HD TV and phone service in four cities and will expand in three new cities by the end of the year. The 100 times faster Internet already has made C Spire the fastest Internet service provider in the state, according to Seattle-based Ookla, which measures broadband Internet connection speeds worldwide through its Speedtest.net app and website. Suzy Hays, senior vice president of Consumer Markets for C Spire, said the company is on a mission to move Mississippi up in national rankings for average Internet speeds and consumer access to super-fast broadband services. “Our initiative already represents the largest single deployment of Gigabit infrastructure – in terms of the total number of communities at one time – in North America,” she said. This is the sixth award that C Spire has received in the last 18 months for its next-generation Internet technology initiative in Mississippi, including those conferred by the Fiber to the Home Council Americas, Broadband Communities and the Mississippi Economic Development Council. “Fiber to the Home is a game-changer and promises to dramatically improve Internet speeds, boost home values, attract investment, create new jobs and improve the quality of life for consumers across the state,” Hays said. “We’re excited about the future and the opportunities we expect this high-tech infrastructure will unlock for the communities who are partnering with us in this historic statewide initiative. The possibilities and opportunities with this type of next-generation Internet access are limited only by our imagination.” The suite of services, which includes 100 times faster Gigabit Internet access, super HD TV and home phone, are competitively priced with additional discounts for C Spire Wireless customers. Online pre-registration remains open in all of C Spire’s Fiber to the Home communities in Mississippi. To pre-register or learn more about C Spire’s Fiber to the Home initiative, visit
www.cspire.com/fiberhome.
About C Spire C Spire is a diversified telecommunications and technology services company that provides world-class, customer-inspired wireless communications, 1 Gigabit consumer Internet access as well as a full suite of dedicated Internet, wireless, IP Voice, data and cloud services for businesses. This news release and other announcements are available at
www.cspire.com/news. For more information about C Spire, visit
www.cspire.com or follow us on Facebook at
www.facebook.com/cspire or Twitter at
www.twitter.com/cspire.