Non-profit operator of NCREN is almost a year ahead of schedule; hosting live Twitter Town Hall today

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, N.C., April 27, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- MCNC today announced the first round of the $144 million Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative (GLRBI) is complete.  All broadband fiber associated with this phase of the project is now active and serving Community Anchor Institutions (CAIs) including K-12 schools, universities, community colleges, health care facilities, public health facilities, libraries, research institutions, and other sectors of CAIs in western and southeastern North Carolina. Through first-phase commercial partner FRC LLC, which invested $4 million into the project, fiber is now available to serve commercial businesses and last-mile consumer broadband needs in these same regions.

The GLRBI is funded through grants from U.S. Department of Commerce's Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) and significant matching funds from private donations and investments including a $24 million investment from the Golden LEAF Foundation. Once complete through two phases, the GLRBI will greatly expand the reach and capacity of the North Carolina Research and Education Network (NCREN) in the state.

"This first phase of the project already is having a positive impact on student learning, patient outcomes in health care, economic outcomes in job creation and community development, and is accelerating innovation and research all across the state," said MCNC President and CEO Joe Freddoso. "Our goal is to continue creating infrastructure that meets the advanced needs of research, education, and health care while stabilizing costs to consumers and small businesses in areas where affordable broadband currently isn't available."

Since the project began, all North Carolina Community Colleges have been connected to NCREN; the video services infrastructure on the network was upgraded; East Carolina University received a 10gig network upgrade and now serves as a hub for most of eastern North Carolina; the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville now has a 10gig connection, Vidant Medical Center in Pitt County became the first not-for-profit hospital connected to the N.C. Telehealth Network via NCREN, and finally, spending on engineering and construction attributed to the project has created and/or saved hundreds of jobs throughout the state.

To celebrate this achievement, MCNC will host its first online Twitter Town Hall today (Friday, April 27) at 11 a.m. EDT and will answer questions about the GLRBI and expansion of broadband connectivity in North Carolina live at www.mcnc.org/btop/townhall. This online-only event is an invitation from MCNC for anyone to participate in an open exchange about the project, its impacts, and future trends concerning networking and the rising need for bandwidth. Questions will be selected both in advance and in real-time during the event. To have your voice heard, tweet in questions using the hashtag #askMCNC. You can track the conversation three ways by watching the event live, follow live tweets from @MCNC or @GLRBI, or search out #askMCNC on Twitter.

MCNC received federal approval to begin the second phase of the GLRBI in June 2011. Since that time, MCNC has mobilized efforts and made significant progress on this portion of the project, which is three-times the size of the first phase.

The total of new miles spanning both projects is currently 2,604. The routes for Round 1 as engineered represent 904 newly-operational miles of which 414 miles are new construction. All Round 1 fiber is now lit and placed into service. The routes for Round 2 as engineered represent 1,700 total miles, of which 1,338 are new construction and 362 are being obtained and/or leased via indefeasible rights of use (IRU) or existing fiber is being upgraded. As of today, 595 miles of new conduit has been built along the Round 2 project route, 292 miles of fiber has been deployed within that conduit, and nearly 307 miles of dark fiber have been obtained via IRUs.

The participating vendors and contractors who worked on Round 1 include: Fiber Technologies for construction/installation of fiber in western North Carolina;  Globe Communications for construction/installation of fiber in the southeast; Comtech for all the fiber splicing related to this portion of the project;  Cisco Systems for providing the Cisco ONS 15454 Optical Design Network Solution; CommScope for supplying all fiber-optic cable and materials; and ONUG Communications for engineering design, project planning, and related services.

All vendors and contractors associated with Round 1 project are either North Carolina-based or have strong N.C. presence. To date, the overall project has been a $73 million infusion of spending with private engineering, materials manufacturing, and optical equipment manufacturers, construction companies in addition to acquiring fiber segments from telecommunications, cable companies, and electric membership cooperatives.

All construction for the GLRBI is to be complete by 2013.

Additional Quotes

"MCNC's goal in seeking private funds and NTIA BTOP matching funds was to provide our Community Anchor Institution users of NCREN a network that would scale to rapidly increasing bandwidth demand at stable costs. Today, with the completion of the first phase of the Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative, we move a significant step closer to that goal."

Mike Murphy
Chairman of the MCNC Board of Directors

"In carrying out its three-part mission of teaching, research and outreach, the University of North Carolina is increasingly reliant on technology and broadband infrastructure. These critical upgrades and the expansion of the North Carolina Research and Education Network will help ensure that our UNC campuses have the digital infrastructure required to scale to our future needs. Every sector of education in the state will benefit from this important investment."

Tom Ross
President of the University of North Carolina

"The future of North Carolina through improved access to education, better healthcare and robust economic development is enhanced with the completion of the first phase of the Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative.  We can only imagine today the innovation and economic growth that will occur in the future due to the expansion of this infrastructure that allows the great minds of North Carolina to collaborate with the world."

Governor Bev Perdue
State of North Carolina

"By 2015, Internet video is projected to be 62 percent of consumer Internet traffic and the number of devices connected to IP networks will be twice as high as the global population. A robust and intelligent network is essential to keeping up with the exponentially increasing demand for access by students, consumers, businesses and organizations in North Carolina and across the world."

Edward D. Paradise
Vice President for Cisco's Global Government Solutions Group and RTP Site Executive
Cisco Systems

"The potential impact of this project on our region's healthcare system can be tremendous. From helping address healthcare disparities in rural areas to addressing the growing physician shortage, this investment comes at a pivotal time in the transformation of our region's and nation's healthcare system. Broadband will serve as the underlying infrastructure for the health information technology that has the potential to improve health care outcomes and control costs."

Edward J. Macko
Director and CTO, Healthcare & Life Sciences Solutions
IBM

"CommScope has been involved in this project since the first shovel went into the ground in two years ago. We are excited that the first phase of this project is completed because it has the potential to provide tremendous, long-lasting benefits to our state's residents. CommScope is proud to be part of several broadband initiatives around the country, bringing high-speed networks to rural and underserved communities. MCNC and its efforts to expand the North Carolina Research and Education Network through the Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative is just one great example."

Ric Johnsen
Senior Vice President of Broadband
CommScope
(CommScope, based in Hickory, N.C., was selected by MCNC to provide materials for both project phases)

"From the beginning, the MCNC team knew we needed great collaborators to successfully implement the BTOP project. CommScope, ONUG, Cisco, K&L Gates, FiberTech, Comtech, Globe Communications, the Office of Governor Bev Perdue, the North Carolina General Assembly, the North Carolina Congressional Delegation, the N.C. Institute for Minority Economic Development, NCDOT, and NCDENR are just a few of the key organizations that joined the MCNC staff in leading this phase of the project to a successful completion." 

Tommy Jacobson
MCNC Vice President of Network Initiatives and Chief NCREN Architect

MCNC & NCREN Community
MCNC is an independent, non-profit corporation. MCNC's main focus is to operate the North Carolina Research and Education Network (NCREN). For a more than a quarter century, NCREN continues to provide advanced Intranet and Internet connectivity to a constantly expanding number of Community Anchor Institutions throughout North Carolina. Today's users of NCREN include all 17 institutions of the University of North Carolina System, all 58 North Carolina Community Colleges, all 115 K-12 public school districts as well as a growing number of K-12 charter and private schools, the majority of the state's private colleges and universities, several non-profit and public health care facilities, and a number of the state's premier research institutions. NCREN also serves as the Internet gateway network for all state employees. MCNC currently is working on a $144 million expansion of NCREN scheduled to be completed by summer 2013. This initiative has been labeled the Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative. Visit www.mcnc.org or follow @MCNC or @GLRBI.

About Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative
MCNC currently is working on a $144 million expansion of NCREN scheduled to be completed by 2013. This initiative has been labeled the Golden LEAF Rural Broadband Initiative (GLRBI).

To fund this expansion, MCNC applied for and received two U.S. Department of Commerce Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP) awards totaling $104 million. In addition, MCNC raised $40 million in private matching funds as required by the BTOP program. MCNC's sources of matching funds included $24 million from the Golden LEAF Foundation, $8 million from the MCNC Endowment, $4 million from private-sector wholesale telecommunications company FRC, and an estimated $4 million through donations of land and existing conduit from individual community colleges, universities, and others including the Albemarle Pamlico Economic Development Corporation. No direct funding from the State of North Carolina was required. MCNC estimates this project will create or save 2,500 engineering, construction, and manufacturing jobs in the state.

Both MCNC awards are a part of a coordinated strategy developed by the Office of North Carolina Governor Bev Perdue, the N.C. Office of Economic Recovery & Investment, and e-NC Authority to improve broadband access for businesses and residents in underserved areas. Once all work is complete, the two rounds of BTOP infrastructure have the potential to serve directly, or through MCNC partnerships with private-sector service providers, more than 1,500 community anchor institutions, 180,000 businesses, and reach more than 300,000 underserved families.

About The Golden LEAF Foundation
The Golden LEAF Foundation is a nonprofit organization established in 1999 to help transform North Carolina's economy. The foundation receives one-half of North Carolina's funds from the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement with cigarette manufacturers and places special emphasis on assisting tobacco-dependent, economically distressed and/or rural communities across the state. The Golden LEAF Foundation works in partnership with governmental entities, educational institutions, economic development organizations and nonprofits to achieve its mission. The foundation has awarded 1,096 grants worth over $490 million since its inception. To learn more about applying for a grant, visit www.goldenleaf.org or call (888) 684.8404. 

Editorial Contacts
MCNC Communications Hotline: (919) 248.4105
Noah Garrett, NGC Communications, on behalf of MCNC: (252) 423.1277 or press@mcnc.org

SOURCE MCNC