C Spire Joins Forces with Industry Leaders to Address Rural Connectivity
C Spire Joins Forces with Industry Leaders to Address Rural Connectivity
February 1, 2019
News
Industry News
Share
C Spire recently announced the creation of a consortium aimed at bringing improved connectivity to underserved rural communities. In collaboration with Airspan Networks, Microsoft, Nokia, and Siklu, C Spire will “test and deploy a variety of broadband technologies in combination with new service and construction models to advance broadband connectivity in rural communities,” according a release. Ultimately the group hopes to bridge the gap in accessibility for rural communities and improve the affordability of services for customers in those regions.
According to an FCC report in 2018 more than 19 million people were without broadband access in the US at the end of 2017, most of which reside in the rural parts of the country. In Mississippi and Alabama, C Spire’s release points out, nearly one third of rural residents have no access to basic broadband.
The group will spend 18 months studying potential solutions for affordable broadband service in these regions, starting with small regional tests and working towards scalable options that can be applied across the country.
“Our nation’s broadband adoption gap is a solvable problem that will not be limited in the next few years by the coming breadth of new technologies themselves, but rather how well we facilitate them to scale at the edge,” C Spire Chief Innovation Officer Craig Sparks said in a statement. “Hyperlocal collaboration and highly automated tools combined with these easy-to-deploy network technologies are going to be key enablers.”
The consortium plans to unveil early trial technologies and locations at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on February 25-28.