EntryPoint Networks
About Us
What We’re About
EntryPoint provides Consulting, Project Management, and Automated Open Access technologies to municipal governments (cities, towns, and counties) and municipal electric utilities seeking to implement Advanced Fiber Optic Networks.
The
Problem
Digital infrastructure has become essential in modern society, comparable to road system and utilities like water, sewer, and electricity. Privately owned digital infrastructure has proven to be prone to monopoly control and the consequent disadvantages of premium pricing, and a lack of local control or influence over community needs and interests. Until now, internet access services have been treated as an amenity or luxury item. The harshness of this reality was underscored by the COVID pandemic. Although the lived experience of people is that digital access and infrastructure are now essential, public policy, public financial tools, and the expectations of public leaders have not caught up with the reality that digital access and infrastructure are now in the same category as roads, electricity, sewer, water, and other essential services.
To compound the problem, a significant amount of federal money is flooding into the broadband market without agreement on the root problems the money can and should solve. Per federal rules, much of the money will flow toward systems that successfully provide nominal connectivity speeds. Broadband availability is being funded rather than broadband affordability. However, there is now data which that suggests affordability is a bigger problem than availability – particularly in urban areas.
Our
Mission
EntryPoint’s mission and set of core competencies are organized around planning and implementing fiber-optic networks that are sustainable as long-term utility infrastructure. A core component of EntryPoint’s mission is to work with municipal partners to make digital access affordable and available to all residents and businesses through a very unique public private partnership (PPP) model, with public ownership of essential utility fiber infrastructure at the core.
EntryPoint’s model uses an advanced automated open access business model to drive competition, increase innovation, and operate this infrastructure as an essential utility.
EntryPoint’s model uses an advanced automated open access business model to drive competition, increase innovation, and operate this infrastructure as an essential utility.
First Deployment
Ammon, ID
In 2016, EntryPoint launched its first fiber-to-the-home project in partnership with the City of Ammon, in eastern Idaho. Since 2016, more than 100 articles have been written about the Ammon Fiber Network. In 2016, the Ammon network was named the Network of the Year by NATOA. October 2017, Harvard University published a detailed Case Study praising Ammon’s unique automated network management technology. In 2019, Fast Company Magazine described the Ammon Network as “the Best Fiber Optic Network in America.” In 2020, the Open Technology Institute released its annual survey of global internet costs and listed Ammon as the network with the lowest cost for Gig internet access worldwide.
October 2019, Fast Company Magazine named the Ammon Network as “The Best Fiber Optic Network in America”.
October 2019, Fast Company Magazine named the Ammon Network as “The Best Fiber Optic Network in America”.
Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society
“Ammon’s platform allows an extraordinary level of competition, innovation, and experimentation by businesses, local government, and residential users alike. And Ammon’s model provides very little, if any, financial risk to the city.”
“The use of virtualization technology to enable retail competition is rare in the United States, and Ammon’s use of virtualization is especially sophisticated.”
Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society
“Ammon’s platform allows an extraordinary level of competition, innovation, and experimentation by businesses, local government, and residential users alike. And Ammon’s model provides very little, if any, financial risk to the city.”
“The use of virtualization technology to enable retail competition is rare in the United States, and Ammon’s use of virtualization is especially sophisticated.”
July 2020, the Open Technology Institute released a comprehensive report documenting “The Cost of Connectivity 2020” globally. Ammon, Idaho is listed as having the lowest cost of fiber-optic broadband in the entire world… ahead of Bucharest, Riga, Paris, Seoul, London, Zurich, Copenhagen, Tokyo, Toronto, etc.
July 2020, the Open Technology Institute released a comprehensive report documenting “The Cost of Connectivity 2020” globally. Ammon, Idaho is listed as having the lowest cost of fiber-optic broadband in the entire world… ahead of Bucharest, Riga, Paris, Seoul, London, Zurich, Copenhagen, Tokyo, Toronto, etc.
EntryPoint’s
Model
The dominant model for delivering internet access in the U.S. is broken. Gaps in network capacity, reliability, availability, and affordability are a product of the structure of the Internet Service Provider (ISP) industry and a misalignment between the incentives and interests of the industry and the needs and interests of consumers. The results of these misalignments include inconsistent reliability, overpriced offerings, lack of competition, lack of choice for consumers, and continued emphasis on what is minimally acceptable rather than what is optimally possible. Much of the country continues to be served by antiquated cable infrastructure when fiber optics are a far superior infrastructure for speed, reliability, and enabling functionality that is necessary in a digital economy.
EntryPoint is focused on helping municipalities transition from minimally acceptable infrastructure to infrastructure that costs less and delivers much greater value to subscribers. Our model is not to suggest mere cosmetic changes to the infrastructure or to accept the dominant incumbent model as a viable path forward.
Three key ideas
behind EntryPoint’s philosophy are:
Fiber Optics provide a media that is orders of magnitude better than all other media (including cable).
Broadband infrastructure is essential infrastructure and should therefore be treated as utility infrastructure.
Open Access Networks are a proven method for lowering costs, creating competition, and giving consumers choice.
EntryPoint designs and implement networks that bring maximum value to consumers by leveraging technologies and open network management systems to dismantle the current power structure and move control to the subscriber. The overarching flaw in today’s incumbent model is that the near-monopoly control of the ISPs leaves the customer nearly powerless. We use technology to reverse this power structure.
