Business-only fiber network Everstream grew to nearly 27,000 miles of route fiber during 2021, increasing its footprint 80% from the previous year.
The company invested $600 million in its expansion, building nearly 2,000 route miles of fiber in new and existing markets and “supplemented that growth with assets from a strategic acquisition,” the company said. Everstream has more than 3,000 route miles of fiber still under construction, in projects expected to be completed by the end of next year.
The company’s growth also included:
- The construction of more than 10 million feet of new fiber for the second consecutive year.
- The addition of two major metro markets — Philadelphia and Pittsburgh — to Everstream’s high-capacity network.
- Densification of existing networks in cities across the company’s footprint, including the company’s networks in Columbus, Cleveland, Detroit, Indianapolis, Milwaukee and across the state of Michigan.
- Increasing on-net locations by more than 15%.
- Increasing its workforce by more than 20% through organic hiring and acquisition, including sales and support teams.
Everstream also contributed to its aggressive expansion through acquisitions from Uniti and Rocket Fiber.
Even with the expansion of Everstream and other companies, the nation’s broadband infrastructure remains below average, the company noted in a press release, pointing to the 2021 Report Card For America’s Infrastructure, in which the American Society of Civil Engineers gave infrastructure in the U.S. a grade of C- amid a $2.59 trillion shortfall in infrastructure spending. Though the Infrastructure Bill has passed with funding allocated for middle-mile connections, that funding is a small fraction of the total digital infrastructure package, according to Everstream.
“Everstream continues to prioritize investing in our network infrastructure by building new fiber and densifying existing assets to ensure the network exceeds our internal standards for uptime, reliability and delivering an ideal customer experience,” said Everstream CEO Brett Lindsey, in a prepared statement.
