Natco Of Flippin Rolls Out 1Gb Internet

Natco Communications Inc. of Flippin has invested over $6 million since 2008 to deliver 1-gigabit broadband internet to homes and businesses in Flippin, Bull Shoals and Diamond City via a fiber-to-the-home network (FTTH), according to president and general manager Steven Sanders Jr. 

According to the roll-out announcement released earlier this week, the private, locally owned and operated communications company’s FTTH network provides almost unlimited bandwidth to transmit voice, data and video signals at a much faster rate than traditional internet.

The 1-gigabit service is available to several thousand homes and 200 to 400 businesses, Sanders said. 

He also said, “I have always thought that our company has been a technology leader, and, these days, there is a lot of choice in vendors that can provide you equipment. And there are a lot of different services you have to choose from when you deploy a new service. It’s a little less clear which direction you should take. By implementing the fiber, it gives us the flexibility to choose a direction and, if the technology has a shift, the amount of capacity we have will allow us to change as the technology changes.” 

Sanders called that “future-proofing.”

He also said, when this effort was launched, Natco had an aging copper cable system that needed to be replaced. As the company was considering its options, the streaming video trend took off, Sanders said.

He said streaming video takes a lot more bandwidth than surfing the web or using email, and one reason the company chose to pursue fiber was because it accommodates that need.

The FTTH network was also a good fit for Natco because the company must bury its lines to withstand storms and the useful physical life of that type of cable is 25 to 40 years, Sanders said. 

Construction and installation of FTTH is planned elsewhere in the Natco service area, which includes portions of Marion, Boone and Baxter counties, the release states. Sanders said the company plans to get the fiber to over half of its service area in the next five years. Natco has started with cities and is working outward toward more rural customers, he said.

The company’s 1-gigabit service is 40 times faster than the Federal Communications Commission broadband benchmark speed of 25 megabits, according to the release, and well above the standard internet speed of 10 megabits available across the U.S.  

The release also states that the most recent Arkansas State Broadband Manager’s Report released Dec. 31 indicates only 2.3 percent of Arkansans and 7.9 percent of U.S. residents have access to 1-gigabit per second (Gbps) download speeds via a wireline network such as FTTH.

Sanders said in the release, “FTTH infrastructure is vital in attracting new industry and technology-driven businesses to our area and providing greater opportunities for the residents we serve. Now, with 1-gigabit service, we can offer advanced technology to our customers that is not currently available to most people in the U.S.”