Local company on fast track to install fiber optic

Jun 18, 2023

A recent groundbreaking ceremony was attended by local government officials, company officers, employees and contractors who have helped make Aptitude's project —to upgrade existing fiber-optic network— a reality. The Farmington-based company is installing new ultra-high-speed fiber optic lines to deliver faster and more reliable internet service to thousands of households and businesses in underserved rural communities.

Aptitude Internet's CEO, Cole Smith, thanked the state and federal government for its support and praised the efforts of his team and partners, saying the project will not only improve the quality of life and economic opportunities for the customers, but also create jobs and stimulate the local economy.

Farmington City Administrator Greg Beavers speaks about the advantages of bringing fiber-optic internet to southeast Missouri.

Aptitude Internet Solutions of Farmington held a groundbreaking ceremony last month. It wasn't to celebrate the planned construction of a new building for the company — founded in 2010 by Farmington residents CEO Cole Smith and COO Levi Henrich, to later be joined by CFO Corey Gibson and CIO Bill Denkler.

According to Casey Reeves, Aptitude's creative director, the April 13 event was held to celebrate the company's future expansion throughout the area after it recently received several American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) grants that will let the company expand its service.

"We did the actual groundbreaking part at the entrance of Winchester Hills since that is one of the areas that we'll be expanding into, and it was kind of convenient as far as being a good local place. The company invited city and county officials, the banks we worked with, the engineering companies we partnered with, as well as the Smart Wi-Fi system company that we partner with," Reeves said. "Then we moved to Crown Point for the reception where Greg Beaver, our CEO Cole Smith, and Zach Stiles from the Missouri Department of Economic Development, spoke. Then we just had a little reception where everybody got to kind of visit and hang out."

Recalling Aptitude's founding 13 years ago, Reeves said, "Cole Smith and Levi Henrich were both good friends of mine from Farmington. The company started as a wireless internet service provider. You go into a little area, build a tower and then mount antennas on it. Then you can connect residents with a line-of-sight connection through a little antenna on the outside of their house. That was the way Aptitude started and grew organically for the first eight or nine years — never even really taking out loans. It was, ‘OK, let's add another tower to our network,’ until we got up to about 30 or so towers."

At this point, the company began to see the writing on the wall.

"As far as internet needs, the wireless could only deliver so much speed, and we were starting to hit the limit of what we could deliver vs. what people needed," Reeves said. "So, we started looking into pivoting into fiber because there's just nothing that's going to be as fast, reliable and future-proof as fiber."

It was then that a worldwide pandemic hit. Suddenly, the need for internet speed increased exponentially.

"COVID hit and it definitely proved that wireless was on its way out," Reeves said. "During COVID, everybody started doing Zoom meetings, kids were learning from home, people were working from home. There was a lot more streaming because you couldn't get out and do as much. Basically, internet usage by everybody in the country doubled. They needed a lot more than what we could provide with wireless, so we really started looking into expanding into fiber.

"Along with that, every infrastructure bill from the federal and state governments put an emphasis on connecting rural residents with reliable high-speed internet so they wouldn't be left behind. If you can't get a good internet connection, you can't take a better, high-paying job online. You can't take advantage of telehealth, whether you're a doctor or an elderly person that doesn't want to drive an hour and a half to Barnes or something like that. If you want to get a higher degree to better yourself but you can't commute to a college, you’ve got to have a reliable high-speed internet connection. So, that's a big part of what these grants are for — helping rural residents catch up."

A couple years ago, Aptitude received a sizable federal grant from the Rural Opportunity Fund that allowed the company to expand into an area that covers the city of Hermann and continues south to Salem.

"We're going to be passing about 14,000 homes out there, which is a lot right now," Reeves said. "We only have about 2,000 customers overall. Since we got that first grant, we've been expanding into the Rolla/St. James area. Then, this last fall, the ARPA grants were announced. The funds were federal, but they were given to each state to divvy up as they see fit. So, it was the broadband office of the Missouri Department of Economic Development's broadband that did that. Cole and Corey worked for about a year trying to secure five different areas in the state for these ARPA grants. We were awarded three out of the five, which is pretty good — and most of that is around here locally.

"There is a small area south of Farmington that stretches through Winchester Hills and Buzzard Rock, and there's a large area which goes north of Farmington along D Highway. It's a pretty wide swath that goes all the way up to St. Francois State Park by Bonne Terre. The third area is southwest of De Soto, and it goes all the way down to Lake Timberline. Those are some big areas with a lot of rural residents, and now we're going to be connecting them with fiber. And we not only deliver fiber — we were the first residential internet service provider to offer a 10 gigabit-per-second speed. That's the fastest anywhere in Missouri — faster than Charter, AT&T, or anybody — and these packages are very affordable."

While the company has already experienced substantial growth, it has no plans to slow its expansion anytime soon.

"We're on a pretty fast timeline with these areas with the ARPA grants," Reese said. "We have to build this out pretty quickly. Construction's already in the works, even though this was just announced recently. But once we get that done, then we can continue our organic growth into other areas, like north of Bonne Terre. There may be some roads up here that weren't included in the build for lots of reasons. Maybe the utility poles need to be replaced, or maybe it needs to be underground and there's some surveying that needs to be done.

"We'll continue to grow from there — road by road, street by street. There's going to be more grant funding opportunities too, so a lot of the areas that aren't connected will still be eligible, and we'll still keep fighting for those areas. So, yeah, we will continue this growth. We're growing out a lot towards Rolla and St. James, but this is our home base. We're all local Farmington guys. Our kids are going to school here. Our families are here. We want to keep the company's home base here and connect all our friends, family and neighbors."

Asked what suggestion he would make to people living in areas where fiber-optic service is now or soon will be available, Reeves said, "Sign up early. It's a big hurdle that we always try and overcome with a bill that's beneficial for us and for residents. There's a ‘check availability’ page on our website. If their address is listed, they need to get signed up early. Then as soon as the build is done, there's two steps to installation. The first is the fiber drop. That is performed by a different kind of crew, a construction crew coming out and running the fiber from the transmission line to a little box on the outside of your house. If, for example, every single resident in Winchester Hills that wants the services in that neighborhood signed up, the crews can go out and knock out dozens of those in a day very efficiently because they can just go door-to-door.

"Whereas, if those trickle in over six months, the crews are running back and forth, and we're not as efficient in getting people hooked up. Then we're on to the next project — say, north of Farmington — and all those crews are up in that area, it's hard for us to go back to Winchester Hills and get people hooked up. That's why we incentivize these early-bird sign-ups with free installation that would normally cost somebody $150. There's no commitment, but that way they get a call as soon as the project is done. We say, ‘It's done and we're ready to get you hooked up.’"

For more information about local fiber-optic service through Aptitude, go to aptitudeinternet.com.

Kevin R. Jenkins is the managing editor of the Farmington Press and can be reached at 573-783-9667 or [email protected]

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