Post Falls, ID – October 26th, 2011: Fatbeam, a Competitive Access Provider delivering broadband access services to customers in the Pacific Northwest, recently signed long term agreements with the Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls Idaho School Districts to build high capacity fiber optic networks and deliver 2 gigabit broadband services to school district facilities. The combined contracts for the networks average 7.5 years in length and exceed $2M in value. The two school districts and Idaho, a state which ranks last in recent reports for technology in the classroom, will gain greater network speeds and be able to access technology services that were not available prior to the new deployment. “As staff and students become more and more dependent on technology in teaching and learning it becomes increasingly important that we provide a robust and reliable infrastructure”, said Jean Bengfort, IT Director of the Coeur d’Alene School District. John Pilmore, Post Falls School District Technology Coordinator, expanded, “We were already past the capacity barrier with our wireless solution and the 2 gigabit fiber network will allow us to do things we simply couldn’t do in the past.” The school’s use of the FCC E-Rate program, which finances essential connectivity upgrades for schools and libraries, also made for an efficient and cost effective solution in the current environment of tight educational budgets.
Additionally, as part of a greater strategy for Fatbeam, the company will build fiber between the Coeur d’Alene and Post Falls markets, add fiber services to the University of Idaho Research Park in Post Falls, and extend the network to the TierPoint facility in Liberty Lake, WA, which provides data services such as colocation and cloud computing. “Having grown up in Coeur d’Alene and now building a broadband fiber optic infrastructure in Coeur d’Alene, it’s like coming home again”, stated veteran telecom entrepreneur Greg Green, Fatbeam’s President and Co-Founder. Green, who partnered with Seattle based entrepreneur Craig McCaw in founding NEXTLINK, was part of the senior management team as the President of NEXTLINK Washington, which went public in an IPO raising over $400M. Later, Green founded regional telecom company OneEighty Communications, which became Avista Communications, a wholly owned subsidiary of Avista Corp where he acted as CEO.
About Fatbeam
Fatbeam is a Competitive Access Provider delivering broadband access services to business and enterprise, healthcare, education and government customers in the Pacific Northwest. While competitive telecom and broadband fiber capacity are mainstream throughout larger cities in the United States, Fatbeam focuses on underserved markets. Fatbeam delivers fiber optic bandwidth beginning at 1 gigabit Ethernet, extending to 20 gigabit and jumping to dark fiber.
Headquartered in Post Falls, Idaho, Fatbeam was co-founded by Shawn Swanby, owner of Ednetics Inc. (www.ednetics.com), and Greg Green (www.greggreen.com).
For further information, please visit our web site at www.fatbeam.com
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