Those were the words of Shannon Martin-Guzman, project delivery manager for the Middle-Mile Broadband Initiative (MMBI), at the January update meeting of the Middle-Mile Advisory Committee in Sacramento. The meeting, in which state CIO Liana Bailey-Crimmins and other officials appeared mostly optimistic about the project, reflected just how close California is to “flipping the switch.”
There are two major milestones for the MMBI fast approaching: One, in the first quarter of the year, the Bishop Paiute Tribe will become the first community to connect to the network. Two, by April the state will award a contract for the network operator.
The operator will handle day-to-day operation of the network, service-level compliance, customer fulfillment and other matters. Meanwhile the third-party administrator, GoldenStateNet, will handle sales, future network expansion and maintenance of the huts. The California Department of Technology will have oversight of both the administrator and the operator.
“The model ensures that no single party can put the network at risk by underperforming because responsibilities can be temporarily handled by others as disputes are resolved,” said MMBI Deputy Director Mark Monroe during the meeting.
According to Martin-Guzman, 5,141 miles of fiber have gone to the installation phase, with 3,389 miles completed. The CDT website for the project lists a total of 8,185 miles for the entire network — so about 63 percent of that is in installation or completed.
Just four vendors account for 6,457 fiber miles, or 79 percent of the network:
- CVIN: 2,672 miles
- Lumen Technologies: 1,880 miles
- Arcadian Infracom: 1,004 miles
- American Dark Fiber: 901 miles
The network has attracted “strong” sales interest, according to GoldenStateNet President and Chief Operating Officer Erik Hunsinger. The administrator has delivered 30 quotes to parties interested in connecting, worth a total of $310 million.
One of the network’s main stated goals is to deliver high-speed Internet to unserved and underserved residents. But sales will also include businesses, including increasing interest from hyperscalers, large-scale cloud computing providers.
“There was a major shift a few years ago in how particularly hyperscalers manage their network,” Hunsinger said. “In early 2010 or so there was a lot of focus on equipment and electronics to meet broadband connectivity but hyperscalers have realized that they can do more effective connectivity with just fiber, so they’re throwing fiber at the problems. And the net result is they need large counts of fiber, more than the state has put in place.”
