Regional ISP LiveOak Fiber tapped Shane Schilling, a veteran of Logix Fiber Networks, as chief technology officer. The hire comes as LiveOak expands its service across Georgia and Florida.
Schilling joins LiveOak with over 20 years of telecom experience under his belt. From 2016 to 2020, he served as CTO at Logix, a Texas-based fiber provider for enterprises. Prior to Logix, Schilling was VP of technical operations at Grande Communications Networks, another Texas ISP, and he spent nearly a decade as director of network operations at Atlantic Broadband (which last year rebranded to Breezeline).
A LiveOak representative told Fierce Schilling “has experience in building all aspects of a telecommunications network, from managing the routers/switches to configuring its back servers and software stacks.” His other areas of expertise include core networking, fiber construction, cybersecurity, corporate IT and service delivery.
Alongside his career experience, Schilling also runs a consulting firm that helps enterprises with their telco and technology needs, according to LinkedIn.
In announcing Schilling’s appointment, LiveOak President Jody Craft stated, “we are excited to leverage Shane’s deep experience in network engineering and service delivery as LiveOak continues implementing buildouts in our key markets.”
Craft told Fierce last July LiveOak is targeting Georgia’s Glynn County and Florida’s Okaloosa County, with the goal to reach 75,000 passings by 2024.
Service is already live in certain parts of Okaloosa County, the LiveOak rep said. In March, the company turned up service in Shalimar, Florida, the first community in the county to get connected. LiveOak is working to get other zones live in the coming days and weeks and is currently laying fiber in initial parts of Glynn County. It expects to light up service in Georgia in the next few weeks.
“The investment in these local communities will expand economic opportunities and directly and positively impact the quality of life for residents and businesses alike,” said Schilling in a statement. “I look forward to fostering and working in the company’s lean-in approach to internet speeds and services for the communities we serve.”
But LiveOak isn’t stopping at those two counties. The provider in February unveiled it has acquired fiber network assets from Alma Telephone Company (ATC) Broadband. ATC Broadband is based in Georgia’s Bacon County but owns assets in the state’s Glynn and Camden counties.
The acquisition, as Craft noted at the time, “reinforces our commitment to serve the Golden Isles and enables LiveOak Fiber to expedite our timeline for buildout in Glynn County and expands our service area to include the businesses and residents of Camden County.”