NTELOS to expand fiber network presence

Regional telco NTELOS this week announced that it will double its West Virginia fiber network presence by acquiring the majority of Allegheny Energy's glass. Va.-based NTELOS currently has a 400-mile fiber network in the region. Through this acquisition, NTELOS will get 500 fiber route miles in West Virginia with much of that fiber residing in the northern part of the state.

Overall, NTELOS is buying close to 2,200 route fiber miles that reside mainly in central and Western Pennsylvania and northern West Virginia. Currently, NTELOS operates a 2,300 route mile fiber network in its Western Virginia and southern West Virginia regions.

"The purchase of these fiber assets and related revenues is significant for NTELOS as we continue to re-position our wire line business from a provider of voice access lines to a provider of high-bandwidth data products," said Frank Berry, NTELOS executive vice president and president of wire line operations in a release.

Allegheny's sale represents the ongoing trend of utilities ending their presence in the telecom market as network wholesalers who tried to cash in on the dot-com drive of the late 1990s--a trend that created a glut of fiber capacity and failed businesses. The utility will sell about 75 percent of its fiber network to NTELOS, while retaining the rest for its own internal use.

For more:
- see the release here
- Charleston Daily Mail has this article

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