Prattville, Ala. (October 8, 2024) – The Alabama Fiber Network (AFN) achieved a new milestone by finishing phase one of the state’s middle-mile broadband backbone. As of September 30th, 38 out of 67 counties, or 67% of the project, is complete. This announcement celebrates significant progress in delivering the world-class network to all counties.
As a middle mile Internet backbone network, AFN is bringing at least 400 Gigabit of resilient capacity to each Alabama county with rapid scalability up to 24 Terabits per second. That capability will support other broadband providers and direct backbone-grade connections for education, public safety, health care and economic development.
AFN’s world-class infrastructure is highly fault tolerant, meaning that each distribution point has multiple pathways to adjacent sites and redundant equipment. These features dramatically increase the availability of services that AFN offers compared to other providers.
“We set an ambitious goal of lighting half of our sites by September 30th, and we’ve accomplished that goal,” said Terry Metze, CEO of AFN. “Thanks to the leadership of our board of directors, tireless work of our team and support of our partners, this is just one of the many milestones we will achieve. Alabama deserves this network, and we’re going to deliver.”
AFN’s owners and partners also provided substantial contributions including fiber optic cable strands, storm hardened locations to place equipment and other project assistance. This support is helping to accelerate completion of the statewide backbone.
In 2022, AFN received its initial grant of $82.5M from the state’s allocation of ARPA funds to construct the middle-mile network. Less than a year ago, the organization set a goal of completing phase one, of the grant, by the end of September.
This summer, AFN celebrated the official launch of the network and announced it’s first last-mile customer, Sprout Fiber Network at 100 Gigabits. As of today, they’ve added four additional 100 Gigabit customers increasing capacity and resiliency, and lowering delays.
“We’re going to keep the momentum going,” said Metze. “We have many more ambitious goals and we’ll keep hitting the mark until we connect every corner of the state.”