After delays last year, Quintillion Networks has an update on the fiber optic cable project that will bring high-speed internet to western Alaska.
The company will start laying cable in June and finish construction in early September. That’s according to Tim Woolston, a spokesperson for the Anchorage-based company. He said local customers should have faster internet by early 2017.
“We feel strongly that high-speed internet is going to provide opportunities for improved health and education services, spur economic development and power local business there, and allow consumers in Nome and other places access to video and other high-speed applications,” he said.
Those other places include Kotzebue, Point Hope, Wainwright, Barrow, and Prudhoe Bay — all of which will be connected by Quintillion lines to a major cable running between England and Japan. Canadian company Arctic Fibre is handling construction for the backbone project.
Quintillion’s CEO is in Nome Thursday night to share more construction details with the public. Woolston said the company still can’t predict how much the new service will cost.
“While it’s difficult, probably impossible, to provide any sort of estimate as to what specifically a monthly bill might be, we expect service is going to be better and the cost is going to be more affordable,” he said.
Quintillion held public meetings in Kotzebue, Point Hope, and Wainwright earlier this week.
Laura Kraegel covers Unalaska and the Aleutian Islands for KUCB . Originally from Chicago, she first came to Alaska to work at KNOM, reporting on Nome and the Bering Strait Region. (laura@kucb.org / 907.581.6700)
