Thursday, April 21, 2011

Micro-Enterprise Meets the Needs of Rural Broadband

I have a Google News alert set up for wireless broadband related news. I see dozens of stories a day. Something about this one caught my eye: "Man brings broadband network to rural Virginia." Perhaps it's my fondly-held roots reaching back to Appalachia. Maybe I just wondered how the story could be about a "man" and not a "company" or "coalition." Whatever it was, I couldn't help but read more.

I'm glad I did, too. For starters, I (like most readers, I imagine) got a good chuckle out of Dennis Hunt's quotes, replete with words like "yonder," "gotta," and of course, "momma." But beyond that, it's a fascinating story of individual determination, ingenuity, and good old fashioned entrepreneurial spirit.

Dennis Hunt was told that providing high-speed broadband to his community simply wasn't profitable. When he made attempts to buy broadband services from the nearest ISP, he was plainly told that there was no money it for them. They couldn't turn a profit piping packets up the mountainside to the few hundred scattered homes in the hills. But Dennis wanted to prove them wrong.

His ingenuity is astounding, and I'll simply leave it to the original reporter to tell that story. If you have not already, click here to see pictures and descriptions of Dennis' 190-foot tall cellular tower which Dennis, now in his 60's, climbs regularly to service.

But what I find remarkable is, first, the scalability of his project and, second, what it could mean for broadband industry. First, scalability. The article notes that Dennis is providing fixed wireless broadband for nearly half what his competitor, AT&T does. But, the business-minded person will also note that Dennis does all of the work himself, bypassing expensive insurance costs for the dangerous tower-climbing job. Then again, micro-enterprise doesn't always have to be scalable. That's the advantage of it. When the income of the entrepreneur is the greatest expense, business can compete on a much different level.

But, though Dennis can compete on a high level with AT&T, he cannot compete on a large scale level. This brings the question: does Dennis' story have any impact on the broadband industry? To be frank: is this news story really news at all? As-is, the answer is no. But he has proven a concept that might have larger ramifications. Smaller ISP's were bought out decades ago and merged into larger, allegedly more efficient conglomerates. Dennis seems to be going the opposite direction. Does a niche exist in rural broadband that can be reached and served economically by micro-enterprise where the big 3 network providers (AT&T, Verizon, & Sprint) cannot justify the expense to reach the customer? Only time will tell.

Labels: ATT, Fixed Wireless Broadband, Rural Broadband