Real Funds Flow into Deployment of Fiber Optic Cables in US
Funds are starting to truly flow into the fiber optic ecosystem in the United States, but the sources of these funds are somewhat unexpected – Middle mile and long-distance fiber optic projects. A good example is that Alabama Fiber Network (AFN) recently reached an agreement with Arista Networks to provide routing and switching equipment for its 6600 mile open access Middle mile network.
-Everyone is waiting for billions of dollars to flow from BEAD into the fiber optic ecosystem.
-The Middle mile network first saw hope and gradually passed it on to suppliers.
-The transaction between Alabama Fiber Network and Arista is the latest example.
Arista’s main business is to provide routers and switches for data centers. But Mark Foss, Senior Vice President of Global Operations and Marketing at Arista, said, “Data center switching is our core market, but Ethernet is an ubiquitous technology that spans many different markets and applications. This particular application is’ Middle mile ‘, which is a service provider application that utilizes Arista 7280 in regional packet/optical networks.”
AFN recently announced that it has chosen Ciena as the optical network provider for the Middle mile project. AFN CEO Terry Metze stated that the total cost of Arista and Ciena equipment in the early stages of the project was close to $11 million.
AFN is an alliance of eight power cooperatives that are building a massive Middle mile network to support other service providers and community anchoring institutions. Ultimately, the Middle mile network will help connect all last mile networks that will be built with BEAD funding. This network will cover all 67 counties in Alabama.
The power cooperation consortium has received $340 million in national funding for the construction of the network. On July 10th, the first customer of the first phase of the network was illuminated by fiber optics. The next major goal of AFN is February 2025, by which time the majority of the Middle mile network will be put into use. The goal of the entire project is to be 100% completed by October 2026.
Middle mile (even the last mile) is on fire again
When the industry expected BEAD funds to start flowing to Internet service providers (ISPs) who would build the last mile network, the middle mile and long-distance networks were first welcomed.
At last week’s Fiber Connect exhibition in Nashville, Joe Pellegrini, President and COO of Great Plains Communications, stated that the service provider is seeking to monetize its Middle mile network in any way possible. This may include transactions that provide fiber optic to households, to cellular towers, and to businesses and data centers.
This week, Lumen announced in its Q2 2024 financial report that it has secured $5 billion in new data center connectivity business, injecting new vitality into its operations. The company also stated that it is about to secure an additional $7 billion in transactions to meet the long-distance transmission needs of data center customers. Last week, Lumen announced that it had reached an agreement with Corning to provide it with a large amount of fiber optic equipment.