The rest of rural northern New England seems to be
in stride with Maine's ambitious
plan to bring broadband wireless acess to remote locations across the region. An exmaple of an initiative to do so
is a group of companies banded together under the Cloud
Alliance, who are working to bring wireless services to areas that most high-speed Internet service
providers would normally overlook, especially in parts of Vermont and northwestern Massachusetts. The government is
also providing some grants for other projects to get this region hooked up, so there definitely is momentum to get the
area on the same technological track as the more populated locations.
Efforts Underway to Bring Wireless Access to Rural New England
Reader Comments
(Page 1)2. To Whom it may concern,
I just recently moved to Portland, I want to extend my hand out to you all as an added resource in your inventory of Telecommunications Networked Professionals and a possible venture partner in my WISP endeavors in Maine.
Please visit my website at http://alarius-net.com/
Also, please see these links for some of my WiFi exploits! http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=lazaro+sanchez+new+orleans&ei=UTF-8&fr=FP-tab-web-t400&x=wrt
I can assist you with "ANY" size job and can do full "turn-key" project work including installation and maintenance assistance. Please consider me for Sales Engineering, Telecom Analysis, PBX (option 11-81 Nortel, succession), Hybrid (Norstar, Partner,Adix, etc..), VM (any/all), networking and advanced network architecture design and implementation (VoIP), server and application deployments, WiFi (Hotel/Motel, WISP design and implementation), and just about anything at all "Telecom/Datacom".
I look forward to hearing from you all!
laz.sanchez@yahoo.com (personal email)
407-756-7109 (personal cell)
Posted at 3:41PM on Aug 10th 2006 by Laz Sanchez
3. Alarius-Net wireless will be formed in 2006 to offer an inexpensive, wireless broadband Internet connection to rural undeserved Maine where there currently is no service of this offering. Alarius-Net will ultimately compete with DSL or cable offerings of other incumbents which serve suburban and metro areas today. Using Wi-fi technology, it is relatively inexpensive to set up a neighborhood network or municipal mesh environment. The company was founded by Lazaro A. Sanchez and long time peer and distinguished colleague Larry McNeill. Alarius-Net will rely on outside investors, the state of Maine tax credits, available grants, and any awards granted for the necessary start-up costs.
The honorable Governor Baldacci of the great state of Maine, has started the "Rural Broadband Initiative" broadband in every home and small business, and the "Connect Maine" directive, we have a great running start and a comprehensive direction to head in. This, along with state representative Hanna Pingree and her aggressive lobbying for broadband expansion, we will succeed. The great "Digital Divide" will be broken and Maine will be a leader with our help.
http://alarius-net.com
Alarius-Net's mission is to serve the people of Maine with a robust and superior long awaited full featured wireless broadband service. We serve the rural Mainer residential, businesses and enterprise customers with reliable, secure and scalable carrier grade broadband wireless network service offerings. Regardless of whether you own a local coffee shop that wants to increase customer traffic with a Wi-Fi Hotspot; live in a residential neighborhood area that wants to enjoy high speed access to our wireless mesh network; or a municipality considering the benefits of blending Wi-Fi and WiMax technologies together to provide a plethora of new wireless services such as mobile high-speed Internet access, Wi-Fi VoIP phone calls or IP television service. We have the only "Wi-Fiber" (wireless fiber) gigabit+ speed feeds into our network and we can serve the communities like no-one else can or has. We take pride in our advantage over our competitors, and we take equal pride in our commitment to you the Maine consumer.
http://alarius-net.com
Posted at 7:20PM on Aug 20th 2006 by Laz Sanchez
4. In his 2005 State of the State address, Governor John E. Baldacci announced his "Connect Maine" initiative that set the goal that 90% of Maine communities have broadband access by 2010. This report provides the results of the work of the Broadband Access Infrastructure Board and discusses the primary recommendations for achieving universal broadband service.
I have been asked what I think our keys to success are. My answer is always the same:
Maintain a well disciplined and phased approached growth.
Absolutely reach attainable profitability by year two by filling the tall orders the state has mandated already, this can make us successful very quickly. Municipal Wi-Fis and Co-Ops will help us reach profitability sooner than later, while allowing us to focus on deeper rural market penetration.
Metro areas and other major cities will hear about us after we establish our first Maine Muni-WiFi Co-Op that offers a full array of communications to rural Maine authorities, healthcare organizations, educational, and civilian residents.
Ensure that the customer's needs are met and maintain a 90% customer retention ratio while trying to achieve a 100% saturation in currently otherwise "dark" markets.
Providing our "competitors" transport of their services to help them achieve their "last mile" into new markets. i.e. keeping Maine businesses competitive and not encourage a monopoly type growth for us. Either way, we benefit from the public relations and marketing that can be leveraged to establish us as the ethical and moral Maine service and wireless consultation provider.
Maintaining diversity, both in infrastructure architecture and in market strategy. Diversity keeps us versatile and flexible in nature. "Change is the only constant in life".
Real estate. The sharing of our tower space with others will seriously subsidize our MRC and that will positively impact our overall OPEX figures.
Keeping shareholders happy by realizing our vision, "Connect Maine"!
Maine’s recently passed legislation expressly allowing municipalities to provide wireless broadband services - in contrast to Nebraska’s decision to ban it - tells me that although these states belong to a political entity called the United States of America, they are anything BUT united in terms of their approach to broadband deployment.
We are in Maine for Maine, and we can repeat our process anywhere else in the United States. I would loved to go back to Slidell, LA and finish what I started. Laz Sanchez
http://alarius-net.com
Posted at 7:28PM on Aug 20th 2006 by Laz Sanchez
5. Gulf States Initiative
MUNICIPAL WIRELESS
CO-OPERATIVE CHARTER
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Mission Statement
To seek a cooperative arrangement from interested communities who desire to partner with Alarius-Net for the purpose of offering the local residents, the business community and the municipal government a 3rd choice for Broadband Internet Access, and the first municipal mesh wireless option that supports and provides a ubiquitous blanket of advanced wireless technologies that serve the entire community foot print.
Primary Goals:
To ensure that the communities contacted understand that we are not soliciting them to engage in a wireless endeavor costing the community millions of dollars to build an infrastructure and to then leave them to maintain it themselves. *This is always an option, but not one preferred by most rural or underserved communities with a small and tight budget.
To ensure that the communities contacted understand that little to NO capital outlay on the part of the town to build or run the proposed service is required for most of our Co-Op options. We finance and build the infrastructure, and run the Co-Op ourselves in most Co-Op scenarios.
To ensure that the new Co-Op introduces a less costly competitive broadband option for residents and businesses within the community’s foot print.
To provide wholesale or “Free” use of infrastructure for all Town offices. Depending on what flavor of “Co-Op” is selected by the municipality.
To provide a wholesale or a “Free” and dedicated network to support Public Safety needs. Depending on what flavor of “Co-Op” is selected by the municipality.
Primary Objectives:
Creation of a more competitive market for Internet Access which should drive better price points and value for the town.
To introduce a reduction in the Town’s operating budget due to cost savings introduced by the cooperative arrangement with the town being a “cornerstone client”.
To guarantee an increased efficiency of municipal operations with the introduction of “Wi-Fiber” gigabit+ licensed microwave technology.
To introduce public safety technologies like video surveillance, tag recognition, automatic WiFi “utilities” meter reading, High Speed Mobility for law enforcement, healthcare “Mobility” for telemedicine, Homeland Security WiFi Mesh, video conferencing and streaming and many other technological advances.
Desired Outcome:
To successfully gain an audience with your community leaders to review a number of proposed “Co-Op” options.
Ultimately, if any options qualify as a possible viable project, a movement to make up project plans is brought up at a subsequent town meeting.
Co-Operative Project Fruition and a satisfied Community.
Key Notes:
Alarius-Net partners with Agility Solutions for lease financing and WiFi consultation. Bill McNamara of Agility Solutions can be contacted for reference or questions concerning our infrastructure financing, technical consultation, implementation questions, and any other municipal or WiFi deployment or ongoing operational questions that you may want answered by our experienced consultants and subject matter experts.
http://www.agilitysolutions.net
Alarius-Net uses the finest carrier grade microwave hardware, towers and installation practices.
Alarius-Net partners with over 80 carriers for bandwidth and dial-tone “wholesale”.
Alarius-Net uses open source Linux servers and appliances for all email, file storage, SAN, DNS, IDS, VoIP IPBX, and other core applications.
http://www.freepress.net/communityinternet/networks.php?scheme=owner
Posted at 7:41PM on Sep 23rd 2006 by Laz Sanchez
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1. If you are done there, could you bring some help over to rural New Zealand areas as well? Due to the telecommunications monopoly here, we are suffering!
Posted at 8:49PM on Dec 27th 2005 by Shaun O`Reilly