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Difficult telecom lessons

UTOPIA is the best thing going. I'm still not getting why the newspapers keep ripping it apart. It will be in the black soon. The internet is smoking fast and cheaper than anything I could get except dial up.

Qwest must have some kind of powerful lobbyists working for them to get this kind of write up.

It is factually incorrect to say Qwest's offering would be as fast as any offered by iProvo or Utopia. UTOPIA offers speeds more than twice the Qwest speed (20Mb/sec. for Qwest vs. 50Mb/sec. for UTOPIA)...and Qwest's slower speed will cost more than twice as much as UTOPIA's faster speed.

Did you read the consultants reports? They reveal that the use of the network for city purposes will result in benefits to the city and residents of Provo in excess of $8M annually. It makes the losses stated by iProvo look like a drop in the bucket.

They can smell blood in the water. Those folks that keep writing FUD pieces about the UTOPIA network. If people understood that they have a choice; They can either go with the "has been" networks of Comcast & Qwest that over promise and constantly under perform, or to an "unbottlenecked" network built for the future that will give them unparalleled speeds. There really is no choice, horse and carriage or an automobile. With a little marketing the public could see through the rhetoric that Qwest is consistently spewing. Maybe the public will one day see the fear in Qwest's eyes and realize that maybe there is something better out there that their executives are trying to quash. The public just thinks that broadband is broadband, which is simply untrue. Amazingly, UTOPIA is cheaper than the services that the public will ever acquire from Qwest or Comcast.

Qwest is putting $300 Million into fiber projects. Utah's portion is about $30 million. That wouldn't even cover the amount of fiber already placed by Utopia. So who would get the Qwest fiber? The places they will make the most money - where existing services exist.

Verizon (the 'Qwest' of back east) is putting billions into a fiber rollout for Fiber to the Home and business. Commendable? What's the motive ... As Verizon places fiber, they rip out copper. The Telecommunications Act of 1996 deregulated telecom services to allow competition on the copper lines. That deregulation does not cover the new fiber. Verizon will not allow competition on the fiber. So it is on it's way to become a monopoly again. This only benefits one group of people. The shareholders. The residents, businesses and providers who lease copper lines will be the losers and the lack of competition will drive prices up.

Many say fiber might be replaced in 30 years. Granted, we can't predict the future, however tests have proven that a single fiber can carry 16 Terabits/second across more than 1500 miles with just a change of electronic hardware. Copper and wireless can't hold a candle to that.

Interestingly enough, it was the recommendation of the the city's telecommunication committee (a panel of citizens not pros) to move forward with iProvo. One of the main reasons to approve was that Qwest didn't want to serve the poor neighborhods.

Also, would Qwest allow for the city use their network for free? Then why bash iProvo?

Same speed? Hardly. Qwest's will still limit the upload speed to <1mb/s while iProvo is symetrical.

Plus, the iProvo competition is spurring Qwest to invest. Sounds like another benefit to iProvo that isn't on the bottom line.

Hey Anonymous,

I would love to hear how UTOPIA will be "in the black soon." I don't see it.

Don't say they're "in the black" just because they bought themselves time by deferring their obligations. That's like me saying I'm "in the black" because I put everything on credit cards.

Keep in mind, the message they�re giving members right now is that if they can't refinance their debt immediately they will call on the cities� sales taxes almost immediately. Doesn't sound like being "in the black soon."

Also, in the papers they say they are �break even� but then don�t include debt repayment in that. Even if they get the debt refinancing, their annual payment on $189 million over 30-ish years is about $12 million. I hope you have that factored in when you throw out terms like �in the black.�

Pop quiz: how much total revenue did UTOPIA generate in FY 2007? Answer: $2.3 million. Not quite enough yet to pay to run a system and cover $12 million in annual debt payments. Let's just say there's a little risk in their future... or I guess it's the cities' risk.

The problem is not with the concept or the electronics. No one that knows the delivery system or the telcom business is involved only techies that know the bandwidth. If you don't know the business or the infrastructure you can't deliver on the technological promise. As for Qwest, that is not fear on their faces, it is hatred.

Perhaps, just perhaps, UTOPIA should have followed the European Model that they claim to be based on and only built the Information Highway and not all the cars and trucks that drive on it.

Think how much farther they could be if they had just installed 24 strands of fiber to every home, without the cost of the electronics. It would have cost a fraction of the current costs and the maintenance would have been miniscule compared to their current costs.

Each resident would have at least 24 Service Providers competing for their business driving the end user cost down.

UTOPIA would have had many more service providers because the lease of the Dark Fiber would have lowered the Market Entry Costs for Service Providers. Also some of their chief competitors, Comcast, the Common Local Exchange Carriers (CLEC's)like XO, and Integra, and perhaps even Qwest would have been their largest customers making the venture less costly to taxpayers.

Maybe, just maybe the Europeans had it right in the first place and that is why they are making Billions of dollars while UTOPIA and iProvo struggle so. Just a thought.

The main issue with UTOPIA was their lack of marketing. When the project was started, the board of Utopia made an assumption that the providers would take care of the marketing. They didn't. That issue alone is the reason the take rates are so low.

The board also knew that litigation was going to be an issue, but probably didn't plan on the intensity. Also, being stiffed by the Federal Government played a big factor in the financial issues.

There were mistakes made, but with these realizations, UTOPIA should redirect their efforts by marketing the open network, showing all of the options/providers that are and will be available on the fiber optic network.

If I recall correctly, the original UTOPIA leaders promised over and over again to every community that the construction costs were guaranteed by contract - and the buildout could not go over budget.

We are now hearing that it did go over budget - WAY over budget. Forget the current situation - the paper should look into who was telling the fib when this whole thing started.

I don't have either option at my house - not even Qwest DSL - did the IPROVO report say why people aren't buying the service? It's a free market - if it's a better service for a better value - people should be buying it. Yey, they do not buy it - why they don't is what I want to know. No lobbyist has access to the people of Provo's checking accounts.

If iProvo is so great, why the high drop rate? Why isn't anyone contacting those who drop the service? Why are they dropping? Same with UTOPIA. Who is really going to pay an install fee of $2,000 to get UTOPIA?

While the above are great ideas, Qwest has the most reasonable and private backed approach at this point in time but that doesn't mean others can't compete with them. Offer UTOPIA to Qwest or Comcast. Get these monkeys off the back of taxpayers.

I don't work for Qwest and can't get UTOPIA (thank goodness) $2,000? Really now!

Kearns Dad: Provo's churn rate has a lot to do with the high student population coming and going. Single-family homes and businesses have a significantly lower churn. UTOPIA does better than most incumbent networks: 0.5% churn, tops. In this industry, that's unheard of.

And Qwest and Comcast have always had an open invitation to join UTOPIA. An invitation that they continue to refuse.