Miscellaneous
The phrase “rural is real” can mean a lot of things, but for independent communications executive Phil Spencer, it means a great opportunity to deliver top-notch broadband access to address consumers’ seemingly unquenchable demand for high-speed data services. Spencer, who is President & CEO of MegaBroadband Investments (MBI), explains the rural broadband outlook in this edition of our ACA Connects podcast, in a conversation with host Matthew M. Polka, who is ACA Connects President and CEO. Partnered with Chicago-based private equity firm GTCR, MBI has acquired rural broadband providers Northland Communications, Eagle Communications and Vyve Broadband and currently passes 600,000 homes and businesses in 15 states. “The vast majority of our customers have one product with us, and that one product is broadband Internet service. Every month when I look at it, it just continues to get bigger and bigger and bigger – the number of single-service customers is just growing like crazy,” Spencer says. A veteran investor in rural cable systems, Spencer calls the growth in the broadband-only customer category “a huge change over the last 10 years” and suggests the decline of the once-mighty triple play (voice, video and data) offering looks irreversible.