Fullerton is teaming up with a Morristown, N.J.-based developer of fiber optic networks to bring the next generation of wireless and internet connectivity to the city.
The rollout of the $75 million program, the first on the West Coast for SiFi Networks, promises to make Fullerton “one of the USA’s largest privately funded open access fiber cities,” according to the company.
Its goal is for the city to be known as the country’s first “FiberCity” once the installation project is complete in about two years.
SiFi Networks said micro-trenching work for the project will begin in August and will minimize disruption for residents and businesses during construction.
Fullerton Mayor Jesus Silva said the project will give the city “a competitive edge that no other city in Orange County currently has.”
Smart Cities
SiFi Networks, which has a U.K.-based office it says has developed similar networks in Europe, said its “aim is to revolutionize the North American telecoms market.”
Its website currently lists three other East Coast locations where it is working on smaller-scale projects.
The company promises its system will be able to handle the next generation of wireless called 5G by providing “gigabit-speed fiber optic connectivity.” In addition to a “significant upgrade” to internet speeds and the ability to accommodate the growing demand for data from next-generation devices in households and businesses, the program should “facilitate new smart city initiatives in key government services such as traffic control, street lighting, and emergency service,” it said when announcing the plan for Fullerton.
“The network is nearly 100% underground,” said Chief Executive Ben Bawtree-Jobson. “We aren’t stringing more unsightly cables along the poles of Fullerton.”
Why Fullerton for its first area deployment? “We were warmly received here,” Bawtree-Jobson told the Business Journal. The company believes Fullerton is in the process of becoming a tech hub, he said.
The installation should bring “competition to the city’s communication needs, and creating enhanced opportunities for economic development,” said Fullerton City Manager Ken Domer.
Last week, the company presented the project at a public meeting at the Fullerton Public Library.
City officials emphasized that public money is not being spent for the network in the city of about 141,000 people.
The presentation featured a trench digger known as the “Ditch Witch” parked outside.
The micro-trenching machine will cut about 12 inches deep and up to 1 ¼ inches wide.
Europe Funding
Dutch pension asset manager APG, which manages about $566 billion, last year put nearly $280 million into a “Smart City Infrastructure Fund” that is managed by Australia’s Whitehelm Capital and will fund the Fullerton network.
APG estimated the investment required globally for this sector will run past $1 trillion over the next six years or so.
SiFi will build, own, and operate the network. The company itself is not an internet provider, but allows other companies to use its network to offer services to homes and businesses.
Customers can join the FiberCity project throughout construction. The primary internet service providers on the network will be GigabitNow of Seattle and Ting Internet of Toronto.
Bawtree-Jobson said the company, which has Southern California offices in Fullerton and El Segundo, has big plans locally.
“We’re talking to a lot of cities in Orange County, the rest of Southern California, as well as the Midwest and East Coast,” he said.
Lowell, Mass., city council members earlier this month gave a preliminary green light to a SiFi plan similar to the Fullerton project, the chief executive said.
The Fullerton project will indirectly employ more than 100 people during the construction period, while there will be a full-time staff long term after the network is built, according to Bawtree-Jobson.
Google, Others
The city’s partnership with SiFi is the latest endeavor in OC in the past few years to address the growing demand for internet connectivity and the next generation of wireless communication.
Irvine was one of the first cities in the country to get Google Fiber, a high-speed network provided by tech giant Google.
Irvine Co.-owned apartments and offices are among the first locations to get Google Fiber, which promises the fastest broadband in the nation, with speeds of up to 1 gigabit per second, roughly 40 times faster than the average internet speed in the country.
Elsewhere in the county, telecom networking infrastructure companies like Newport Beach-based Mobilitie and Crown Castle, with local offices in Irvine, are working to get municipalities’ approvals to install their above-ground systems, to prepare for 5G network deployments.
SiFi is one the lesser-known companies operating in the deployment sector locally; as such, there are likely to be some questions about the Fullerton project long term.
“The major issue is how much market share is needed to generate a sufficient revenue stream,” says Steve Blum, head of Tellus Venture Associates, a broadband, digital, and telecoms consultancy in the Northern California city of Marina.
“I’ve never seen estimates lower than 30%, and I’ve seen it in the 60%-plus range,” Blum told the Business Journal. “Even getting into the 30% range means achieving competitive parity with Charter Communications Inc. and AT&T Inc., and that will not happen in the near term. Over the long term, maybe or maybe not.”
The SiFi chief executive said the company may consider partnering in some areas.
“Our network is designed to complement 5G networks,” Bawtree-Jobson said. “So we are open to partnering with the likes of Crown Castle, American Tower, and Mobilitie to expedite their route to market.”
Officials with some of those companies told the Business Journal this month that they weren’t too familiar with SiFi or its plans in the area.
Bawtree-Jobson said there are several factors that separate SiFi from the Google Fiber project, including Google’s model that means “only those areas with high pre-subscriptions get built,” while there is competition on the SiFi network “from day one.”
