Mr. Morris will be liveblogging this evening at 7 PM EDT.
I appreciate the invitation to participate in this important dialogue regarding public/private partnerships. My name is Paul Morris and I am the Executive Director of the Utah Telecommunication Open Infrastructure Agency or UTOPIA. UTOPIA is a consortium of 14 Utah municipalities, big and small, urban and rural, joined together to build and operate a fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) network on an open access wholesale basis. Our purpose in building the network is to promote economic development and enhance the quality of life for our residents. The initial offering is 100 Mbps up and down to each home and business. The network is designed to allow for continual increases in speed as the need arises. We see a day, in the not to distant future, where each home will have a Gbps or more of symmetrical speed.
We think the best way to achieve these goals is to create a true public/private partnership where the public side focuses on infrastructure, a traditional government role, and the private sector, which can react more nimbly to the market, offers current and next-generation services. Because it is an all fiber network, it allows for this abundant bandwidth, and because it is open access, multiple providers compete against one another for the consumers' dollars, thus creating an environment for robust competition and innovation.
The 14 cities represent a population of almost 500,000 people. We are still in the construction mode. We have passed over 20,000 units in portions of 6 of the cities, and we are currently under construction in another 5. There are 4 services providers using the network and additional providers will shortly follow; and, there are over 6,000 subscribers with more being added weekly.
We look forward to learning from like-minded communities and individuals, as we collectively progress in creating next-generation broadband networks that enable and support our communities and their businesses and citizenry. We also welcome Congressional support in advancing the concepts engendered in these public/private relationships.
