BEAD funding is intended to provide broadband connectivity to previously underserved locations.

Columbia County, Oregon, has been recommended for $9.5 million in funding through the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program, which is particularly significant because Columbia County is one of only four public entities in Oregon to receive such an award. For a county that has long faced challenges in making high-speed broadband available to all businesses and residents, this represents an important step toward closing longstanding service gaps

Preparing for County Broadband Opportunity

Broadband infrastructure gaps have an increasing economic cost. Recognizing the importance of reliable broadband for economic development, education, and healthcare, Columbia County took steps to position itself to improve service availability and pursue federal broadband funding opportunities.

Columbia County started the process by identifying underserved areas and developing a regional broadband plan. Next, Columbia County engaged Strategic Networks Group to support this work, by helping the County make the economic case for broadband and conducting a comprehensive Broadband Economic Feasibility Assessment. This detailed assessment demonstrated how a County-owned fiber network could be financed through a combination of residential subscriptions and community anchor institutions (CAIs) connectivity. It also provided crucial evidence that the network could achieve financial sustainability by serving both high-cost rural and commercially viable areas, which is a key component in making the business case for public investment.

Columbia County also facilitated critical partnerships with local Public Utility Districts, putting together infrastructure agreements that provided in-kind asset valuation to  offset cash contributions needed for BEAD’s 25% matching requirement. Beyond the matching funds, those partnerships enhanced the overall broadband project by demonstrating how utilities could benefit from fiber access for their own operations while supporting expanded connectivity throughout the region. Other project stakeholders included local business organizations, port authority officials, and municipal jurisdictions within the county who participated in a coalition of local partners that support the project and advocate for long-term viability.

In preparation for BEAD, the County established a contracting framework that brought in a qualified operating entity. Through a competitive process, an open access network operator was selected. This partnership was central to the County’s BEAD application, focusing on network sustainability and operational capacity to ensure the project aligned with BEAD funding goals. The network operator, in turn, benefited from the established  County-wide support for the broadband initiative.

Navigating Program Changes and Award Summary

The journey to receiving the BEAD award recognition has not been straightforward. Midway through the BEAD application process, new federal guidance required states to adjust their programs to incorporate what became known as the “Benefit of the Bargain” round. This new phase required states to select the lowest-cost applicants for BEAD-eligible locations, regardless of technology. By adapting quickly and working closely together, the County and network operator were able to keep their application strong and secure awards for the County.

The state of Oregon awarded a total of $620,732,751 to broadband projects through the BEAD program, with only $15,032,943 of awards to public entities (less than 3%). Columbia County received nearly two-thirds of those public entity BEAD award monies across three school districts. The award for Columbia County includes over $9.5 million in broadband funding to bring service to more than 2100 unserved and underserved locations across the Rainier, Scappoose, and Vernonia District Grant areas. These investments will directly benefit households, small businesses, and community anchor institutions that currently lack adequate access to reliable, high-speed internet.

The awards are pending review and final approval by the NTIA, with a decision expected for the beginning of December 2025.

Looking Beyond BEAD

While the BEAD awards are an important milestone, they are not the end goal. Columbia County has faced persistent broadband challenges, with large portions of the county still lacking reliable service. Building on the BEAD-funded projects, the network operator is looking to use this as an opportunity to expand its network and extend service more broadly across Columbia County. By doing so, the County aims to create a sustainable broadband infrastructure that can meet community needs for decades to come.

“What began with a recognition that county residents lacked sufficient broadband access, has grown into a multi-year project to provide a solution, that recently reached a major milestone – our preliminary BEAD award. This effort has required a great deal of problem-solving, multi-agency collaboration, and resilience, but I’m incredibly proud of what we’ve accomplished so far. Reliable broadband unlocks opportunities—remote work, home-based businesses, telehealth, education, and economic growth. I’m committed to bringing these opportunities to every part of our community and thankful for the partnership with SNG, a steady and crucial source of support throughout this journey.”

Holly Miller, Columbia County IT Director

Building a Stronger Future

This award recognition highlights the progress Columbia County is making toward improving broadband access. Reliable internet is increasingly essential for tele-workers, students, businesses, and residents alike. By moving these projects forward, the County is laying the groundwork for stronger communities, new opportunities, and improved quality of life for its residents.

Strategic Networks Group is proud to support Columbia County in reaching this milestone. We look forward to continuing our work as these projects take shape and building towards a more connected future.

Contact SNG to learn more about SNG’s projects and how we help communities achieve their broadband goals.

Camp Sherman, Oregon: A Community in Need of Broadband

Camp Sherman has road and bridge infrastructure. They are working to get digital infrastructure.
Photo: Camp Sherman Bridge across the Metolius River by DBerry

While it may not face the same economic barriers as many other rural areas underserved with broadband – with household incomes approximately 20% higher than the Oregon average – Camp Sherman, Oregon, has broadband gaps and is now stuck in broadband limbo.

Camp Sherman is a small, unincorporated community nestled in the Deschutes National Forest of Central Oregon. The community has clear goals to improve connectivity. Local leaders and residents formed a broadband task force, engaged stakeholders, and launched CampShermanFiber.com to share updates and rally community interest. While these important steps have shown the community has demand and a pressing need for broadband, there has been difficulty in achieving results.

Even though the area was selected as a Federal broadband RDOF grant award recipient in 2020, the project never came to fruition. Like many other communities facing similar hurdles, the program that provided a brief period of hope for residents to get broadband service, ended up as a default on commitments, leaving the goal of achieving high-speed internet back to square one.

Today, Camp Sherman remains unserved by fiber. Residents rely on satellite or fixed wireless connections which have proven inadequate for work-from-home professionals, students, and local small businesses. Additionally, Camp Sherman is under the canopy of conifers, obscuring the sky view of satellites and many residences and businesses simply cannot connect to satellite providers, leaving them with no option at all to connect to the internet.

Camp Sherman also highlights the unique challenges of rural broadband planning:

Camp Sherman shows that even relatively affluent communities, the so-called “haves”, can still lack broadband access and thus ‘have-not’.

When it comes to building digital infrastructure, there is no substitute for working closely with a community to address its specific needs. There is no a one-size-fits-all solution to providing internet service in places that struggle to attract traditional market driven investment.

An individualized case must be developed to show that utilization of broadband from a community’s residents and businesses can support an investment in digital infrastructure. Building an economic case for investing in broadband needs to breakdown traditional silos and bring together many factors including the need to support online services such as telehealth, online education, and public safety communications. In addition, the support of community leaders is paramount to supporting the long-term vision and the benefits that internet connectivity can enable for a community. There are also other considerations such as, an area’s relative vicinity to other regional municipalities, which can increase the scale of broadband planning and develop the market viability to support digital infrastructure investment.

“Black Butte School District has been leading the charge in Camp Sherman towards fiber, for over 10 years. We have experienced one devastating set back after another, leaving us now in a state of limbo. We are wondering if anyone will believe us when we say that satellite and fixed wireless internet do not work under the canopy of pines. Fiber is our only option for our community to enter into the 21st Century. Without it we will simply be limping along patching together solutions that do not actually fix the problem. We live at least an hour away from most doctors, and would love to choose to video conference with them, but with satellite providers, these calls drop, skip, or become garbled. Many people choose not to invest in our community because of our lack of internet, so the long-term sustainability of our community is in the balance.” Jennie Sharp, Special Projects Manager, Black Butte School District 

What Can Communities Do Now?

With delays and uncertainty in government broadband funding (e.g. BEAD and RDOF) , communities need a new strategy—one that’s locally driven, financially sustainable, and less dependent on government subsidies.

Plan for Action, Not Just on Paper

Communities need to go beyond high-level strategies and feasibility studies that are not actionable. They need to produce investment-ready, technically and financially viable broadband plans that align with market opportunities. Broadband planning and technical feasibility assessments need to aggregate demand and build a sustainable business case that will attract internet service providers (ISPs) and infrastructure investors.

Bring Funding Options to the Table

Consider options such as revenue bond financing and public–private joint ventures, which are powerful tools that exist for communities to leverage municipal and stable market conditions in order to help clients structure broadband projects that do not rely solely on slow-moving federal programs. Communities that are ready to take steps to address broadband should determine the best approach that suits their current status and aims (see Options to Bridge Broadband Gaps). 

Engage Local Partners who are Stakeholders

Some of the most valuable partners in the broadband space, are local organizations that are already or could/should be using the internet as a part of their everyday operations. These can include local education and health institutions, as well as non-profit and government organizations that are directly engaged with the local community. Understanding the needs of these organizations can help shape the best approach to solving broadband challenges and improving utilization.

Use Data to Build Support and Reduce Risk

By conducting granular market assessments and financial modeling tools help communities delineate and define underserved areas, quantify demand, and evaluate the economic impacts of broadband investments, communities can provide validation for return on investment that is critical for securing stakeholder buy-in and minimizing risk for investors.

The Bottom Line

We’re in a moment where the broadband future feels uncertain. But that does not mean communities should wait. It means they should act.

Taking action on your broadband future includes:

Contact SNG for more information about how we help communities overcome these challenges, avoid common pitfalls, and deliver results in broadband planning and deployment. Let’s build broadband infrastructure that gets funded, built, and drives community benefits by starting with two questions:

  1. Are your community leaders ready to move forward on a broadband initiative? Use the Digital Needs and Readiness Assessment to find out
  2. To what extent could existing telecommunications budgets finance your digital infrastructure? Take the Broadband Economic Feasibility Assessment

How Jefferson County, Oregon Secured $19M for Broadband — With a Plan Built on Local Insight and Hard Data

In rural communities like Jefferson County, Oregon, broadband isn’t just about speed — it’s about access to opportunity. Whether it’s farming operations relying on remote sensors, local students trying to do homework and access remote learning, or small businesses needing to reach customers online, reliable internet is essential infrastructure.

That’s why in 2021, Jefferson County partnered with Strategic Networks Group (SNG) to take a hard look at their broadband challenges — and opportunities. The result? A detailed, data-driven plan that helped the County successfully secure $19 million in broadband funding from the state’s Broadband Deployment Program.

Understanding Local Needs

SNG started by working closely with County officials, local stakeholders, and tribal representatives to understand the full picture. Broadband gaps in Jefferson County weren’t just about geography — they were tied to how people lived, worked, and accessed services across the region.

Through interviews, planning sessions, and our Digital Needs & Readiness Assessment, we helped surface the community’s broadband priorities:

This kind of listening and understanding local needs was essential — it laid the groundwork for a plan that reflected the realities on the ground and incorporated direct input from local leaders who emphasized the need for equitable access, resilient infrastructure, and long-overdue investment in rural connectivity.

Filling in the Data Gaps

 SNG then got to work collecting the data needed to make the case for investment, including:

One of the most striking findings? Nearly 80% of residents said they’d switch providers if better service were available — clear evidence of unmet demand.

Turning Insight into Strategy

With strong local input and a solid dataset in hand, SNG worked with County leaders to develop a broadband strategy. This wasn’t a generic plan — it was tailored to Jefferson County’s geography, economic goals, and technical realities.

The strategy included:

The goal was to equip the County with a clear, actionable roadmap to guide decisions, attract investment, and take meaningful steps toward a more connected and resilient broadband future.

A Plan that Delivered Results

Following Jefferson County Commissioners’ official adoption of the Broadband Assessment and Strategic Plan, the County had a clear picture of the approach and infrastructure improvements required to achieve results.

Working with SNG to develop a funding application grounded in local priorities and backed by strong data, the County successfully secured nearly $19 million through Oregon’s Broadband Deployment Program. This funding will support the expansion of fiber broadband to over 1,800 unserved and underserved locations, in partnership with a local private internet service provider.

It’s a big win — and one that didn’t happen by accident. It happened because the County had a clear, data-backed plan and could show how investment would translate into real benefits for residents, businesses, and institutions.

What This Means Going Forward

Now, Jefferson County is moving into the build-out phase. But the work doesn’t stop with construction. The County is continuing to draw on the guidance provided in SNG’s strategic plan as it explores ways to support adoption and ensure the network reaches those who need it most — including through digital navigator programs and ongoing coordination with tribal and regional partners.

For more information about this project, visit SNG’s webpage for Jefferson County

More information about the Broadband Deployment Program Oregon Awards

With more and more funding for broadband – for example, the US’s $100 billion through the American Jobs Plan, or Canada’s Universal Broadband Fund – unserved and underserved localities should be encouraged by these positive and significant steps. However, there are a number of uncertainties:

SNG recommends that localities proceed with their own and/or private investment to build digital infrastructure and to not lose any additional time in bridging broadband gaps. No locality can wait to catch the next wave of broadband funding. COVID-19 has accelerated the urgency that digital infrastructure be available to all – now.

In parallel to developing their own broadband investment solutions, localities should apply for broadband funding once the application process is available. If their application is funded, great – then use public funds to support and expand a healthy competitive broadband marketplace that connects all local premises with digital infrastructure that can provide needed redundancy by being available to multiple providers.

For those localities that know they have broadband problems, but struggle to find a path forward – especially when potentially large investments are needed … there is an alternative strategy. Localities need to answer key questions on how to solve their broadband needs:

SNG can help in this process with our Broadband Technical Opportunities Roadmap to answer these questions and empower localities to develop their own strategies so they can effectively engage with service providers and other partners to take action. Broadband is too important to your community’s prospects not to own your digital future.

Investing in community digital infrastructure is a low-risk impact investment with steady returns – and a solid alternative to traditional investments where there is increasing volatility (stock markets), uncertainty (e.g. oil and gas industry), or marginal yields (investment grade bonds). Private investors and patient capital are part of the solution for communities.

Patient capital enables pivoting to an economic case for investing in community digital infrastructure, capturing new revenues from local economic growth by growing the local economy through broadband and digital transformation. Revenue from increased local economic activity is captured through additional subscriptions (higher take-rates), higher value-subscriptions, and value-added services.

An economic case for investing in digital infrastructure is what communities and the broadband industry have been waiting for – now it is time to execute. The COVID-19 pandemic has sharpened the argument that the case for broadband is not just economic – but existential. Elected officials, local decision-makers, and community leaders have to understand that:

Communities seeking better broadband need solutions now. Investors are looking for steady returns. SNG has established an economic case to engage investors and bring private capital to deliver community digital infrastructure, digital transformation, and workforce development.

We start with digital infrastructure for the new economy, which is more than simply fast internet access. Community digital infrastructure is a network platform that connects all residents and businesses (like roads) so that every community member can access and effectively participate in the increasingly online economy. Digital transformation and workforce development increase local innovation and digital inclusion, which grow the local economy and workforce – whose growth further expands the local market for broadband and value-added service revenues for the digital infrastructure network. This virtuous cycle yields indirect community benefits, such as local business retention and growth, new good-paying local jobs, increased local GDP and tax base, increased autonomy and quality of life, among many others.

You have a new way to bring private capital and community digital infrastructure together and get this done.

As a local leader or elected official, you may need to decide whether or not you need a survey, or a study for your broadband initiative. If the value isn’t clear, or if it doesn’t get you closer to your goal, why spend time and money on a ‘survey’ or another ‘study’? Don’t do it just because another community has.

Understand which communities have achieved their broadband goals and how they got there.

If you have areas that are unserved or underserved with broadband, private sector providers have not seen enough of a business case for them to invest. Low density, tough terrain, insufficient take rates to make a business case, etc. are realities that must be overcome and will require more than re-packaging of your market, or expounding on ‘we have a great community’. If service providers have a better return on their investment elsewhere, that is where they will invest.

To get broadband deployed to your unserved or underserved areas there are generally three options going forward – 1) entice a provider to deploy in your area by subsidizing their business case; 2) build your own network to compete directly with other incumbent providers; or, 3) build your own digital infrastructure which multiple providers can then use to provide services (like municipal roads which are built, owned and maintained by the municipality, but anyone can use them).

Regardless of which option communities choose, elected officials would want to be in the best position to negotiate and to decide the best path forward for their community by understanding the broadband investment options, the market potential, and the community returns on investment (ROI).

As a builder of broadband networks explained, ‘take rates’ and ‘revenue generation’ are really the opposite of what a community wants to achieve. A community needs to focus on the development of a sustainable model that does not restrict, but enables sustainable future growth. What communities nor providers don’t know is what broadband can do to sustain and grow what the community already has, as well as how that growth has been suppressed by lack of or slow broadband investment

For these reasons assessing broadband demand is not a survey, but necessary due diligence on the market potential and choosing your broadband strategy (bringing providers to serve your areas, or building your own) while ensuring the best return for your community.

We know that providers already have their expected take rates and will use their spreadsheets in developing their own business case. However from SNG’s extensive research, the majority of the community benefits from broadband are off-balance sheet to providers – which means providers under-value their return on investment as compared to community returns on investment (i.e. community benefits). We call this an economic case for investing in broadband – some people call it a government business case. It’s the same reason we have public investment in roads.

For those considering a public-private partnership, if you know that you have a strong market potential (current and future demand) for broadband and value-added services, this will strengthen your position on negotiating how much your community needs invest to make a successful business case. On the other side, if your unserved and underserved areas do not show a strong demand then you may want to limit your risk, or take actions to build up demand. It is also possible that some areas have higher demand than others, which can allow you to be more tactical with the timing and prioritization of broadband deployments.

Data points on market potential inform your investment case for whether you choose to negotiate with an ISP by developing an RFQ or RFI for a public-private partnership, or if you decide to build your own digital infrastructure. We’ve written about this issue in our recent post: Where do we put our efforts to get connected with broadband?

SNG has recently launched the Digital Economy Demand Checkup offering with a regional ISP (who were the ones that requested we do this) and we think it will be of interest to communities everywhere because it:

We are able to address these fundamental investment case issues in a cost effective way with our Digital Economy Demand Checkup. Not only do we identify current demand, but also potential demand and market potential. We don’t know of anyone else that can benchmark demand to increase service provider revenues and maximize local economic impacts. For example, with a municipal service provider we identified a 64% increase in revenues for no additional capital investment. This represents an increase of 47% in Average Revenue Per User (ARPU).

SNG was recently asked by residents from a neighborhood just outside Nashville, Tennessee, where to best put their efforts to get connected with broadband. They have lived in a location for 10 years and it is not serviced with high-speed internet even though they are near where it stops on either end of their community. Asking the incumbent providers in their words “has proven futile” to getting better service. However they have many neighbors who would be interested in better internet service because many have businesses and work from home and they don’t want to move.

At SNG, we understand this challenge, which too many residents and businesses face across North America because of their perceived addressable market, expected revenues vs. cost to service their market, low density, etc. Approaching private sector providers can be ‘futile’ if those providers do not see enough of a business case to invest in your area and when providers have better returns elsewhere.

The challenge to get broadband deployed in unserved or underserved areas is to enable a positive case for investment. Driving awareness and utilization of broadband with local residents and businesses drives local economic growth and community benefits – which makes a case for public investment to bridge broadband gaps.

Two Options Going Forward

There are generally two options going forward – either 1) a public-private-partnership to entice a broadband provider to deploy in your area by subsidizing their business case; or, 2) build your own digital infrastructure which multiple providers can then use to provide services (like municipal roads which are built, owned and maintained by the municipality, but anyone can use them).

Subsidizing a Service Provider’s Business Case

If you choose to subsidize a provider’s business case to bridge their gap between their costs and their expected returns on capital, then local dollars should be used to build infrastructure that the locality owns (like a tower, backhaul fiber, etc.). This retains local ownership and negotiation capability which may be needed if there is poor broadband service because the provider is exercising a market dominant position. Retain ownership and control of your digital future.

In working with providers, there is also the option of conducting a broadband demand assessment to identify people ready to sign-up to new service, as well as assess potential demand for online services. This is local market demand research. Private sector providers are often reluctant to spend their retained earnings on such research, especially if they are unsure there is a business case for them. By quantifying current and potential broadband demand up-front and sharing that with private sector providers, they can apply that data to their business models to see if there is a business case for them that previously ‘flew under their radar’. Having a contact list of people who are ready and committed to sign-up makes that business case for the provider even stronger.

In both these broadband public-private-partnership instances, local funds subsidize one service provider. This may be a tactical, less complicated, and a less involved way for a locality to move forward – who in their right mind would want to take on more work, especially a broadband initiative! However, performance agreements should be negotiated and periodically reviewed to ensure local residents and businesses are getting the broadband they need – and want.

Investing in Digital Infrastructure

The other approach is the locality investing in their own digital infrastructure which is more involved, more complicated, and longer term. But this approach addresses the issue of local ownership and control of essential infrastructure – as with other infrastructure like roads, or electrical where community benefits are significantly greater than a private sector business case. At SNG we call this the economic case for investing in broadband. The example of Ammon, Idaho, proves that it is possible for a locality to own their digital future while also allowing multiple providers to provide competitive, robust internet services that meet the needs of local residents, businesses, and organizations.

Deciding where and how to get started depends on the addressable market of the locality (i.e. broadband market potential), the local champions available to drive the process, the local organizational capacity to support a broadband initiative, and whether local residents, businesses, and organizations (government, education, health) have an understanding and vision of how they can benefit from using online practices. The table below outlines a roadmap to get started with broadband and SNG’s suite of services that have been designed to help you make the right decisions based on your needs and circumstances, no matter what stage you are at in the process.

Where and How to Get Started with a Broadband Initiative

If you are interested in assessing at what stage your locality is in the process of getting broadband – because it is a process – we have the Digital Needs and Readiness Assessment that your local broadband champion can take online. When they completed the 10 minute online survey, a report will be generated and automatically be emailed to them. We developed this tool specifically to help local leaders understand at what stage their locality is and to help them prioritize their community goals and priorities. SNG’s goal with this is to help local leaders make better informed decision on how they can and need to move forward in a way that is pragmatic, clear, and cost-effective.

The broadband lifecycle: demand analysis and pre-planning

By Michael Curri

Much too often broadband initiatives that should be successful end up falling flat – for a Making_plans myriad reasons.  Perhaps they do not get off the ground because of a lack of vision, planning, or leadership. Many fail during the strategy and build-out process as they lack focus and/or sufficient investment of time, energy, and resources. Some initiatives may have been successful building the network but fail because they are simply taking a “we built it – you use it” approach and not driving applications and adoption. And even the most successful broadband projects, with ample utilization and economic and social impact can be perceived as a failure if the outcomes are not measured and reported.

It is for all of these reasons that SNG encourages its customers (and all broadband project managers for that matter!) to design and run their broadband initiative with “one eye on the Broadband Lifecycle.” In this issue of Bandwidth, and the next two, we will be taking a look at 2 of the 6 steps of the Broadband Lifecycle. In this issue: step 1 (identifying gaps, needs, and demand) and step 2 (pre-planning and assessment). 

BLC2

Step 1: Identify gaps, needs, and demand

Before you jump in with both feet (and fistfuls of dollars), ask yourself: does your community need (more) broadband? Is your region’s current infrastructure insufficient when it comes to meeting the needs of your entrepreneurs? If the answer to either question is YES – then the most important task in step one is to determine how a broadband investment can eliminate community shortfalls and create solutions for economic and civic advancement.

Critical here is to identify your community’s specific needs. Don’t make the mistake of simply following any “tried and true best practices” that you think may apply in your territory – as the gaps and needs for one region are not necessarily yours. Don’t scrimp on research in this stage – too often it is feared that research is too slow and expensive – or just unobtainable. However, we know it can be done. Strategic Networks Group (SNG) has for years been helping governments, at municipal, regional and national levels, to best understand where investment will make the biggest impact. [Most recently SNG has helped Alberta (Canada), Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia with a variety of data collection solutions, including e-Solutions Benchmarking.]

Step 2: Pre-planning & assessment

Make sure you have your “ducks in a row” and all of your stakeholders/partners on board before moving forward with the next step (developing a strategy). What do you need to implement a successful broadband deployment? What leadership and partners do you need to achieve your community’s goals? What components need to be included your deployment? Keep in mind that having a well-represented group of invested parties in your community helps create the momentum you need for a wide-reaching, successful project.

Make sure you take into account your community’s assets: each community has both different needs and different strengths – and those strengths will be uniquely leveraged via the broadband-enabled “platform for innovation”. Too often communities take shortcuts. Instead of uncovering what the needed resources are, or how to leverage current efforts to best serve the specific and unique needs of the community, civic leaders race to copy what another community did. [Contact SNG for our numerous case studies in this phase, including work in Miami (FL), Akron (OH), the Canadian provinces of Ontario, Toronto, Manitoba, and Australia.]

No matter where you are on the Broadband Lifecycle, you can turn to us for leadership to help navigate through the challenges and pitfalls of each step, maximizing your project’s economic impact and civic advancement.

Next Month: Steps 3 (e-Strategy & decision to invest) and 4 (Build or expand network capacity).

How to invest wisely – 4 key guidelines

By Doug Adams

Now that you have funding, how can you make sure that your project lives up to the promise that got it funded in the Invest_wisely_SNGfirst place? Hundreds of broadband projects are being funded in 2010 – be it from Stimulus or some other funding source – but how many will truly become a community asset that drives economic and social benefits?

 Key to making sure your project will have a return on investment with quantifiable outcomes starts with these four guidelines:

  1. Don’t focus on engineering: it’s all about awareness and adoption;
  2. Use data to drive decisions before, during, and after the project;
  3. Create a “platform for innovation”: investing in broadband is NOT just about the financials;
  4. Frame the benefits, measure them, and promote.

Don’t focus on engineering. It’s all about awareness and adoption.

Broadband planning should start with current and future demand of e-solutions by individual businesses, organizations and households. It is natural to focus on the tangible always – the network build, the nuts and bolts of it all – it is how we’re programmed… to follow a blueprint and build.

But building without utilization is a fruitless (although significant) exercise. It’s the utilization, the applications, and the resulting increased productivity, competiveness and innovation that your network creates that are the reasons for investment. Never lose sight of this. It’s the “off-balance sheet” benefits to the private and public sectors that are key for your broadband initiative to bring community value. And the key to deriving value is, and always will be awareness and adoption. Often requiring campaigns targeted at the individual business, organization and household level.

By always keeping your eye on driving adoption, the public investment will be seen as a successful part of community growth.

Use data to drive decisions – before, during, and after the project.

Broadband planning is part of strategic planning for a community / region. Without an assessment of current utilization, or a vision of what the utilization could be, how can an appropriate network be built?

Make sure you do the legwork (research) to understand what how local businesses need to do to be productive and competitive and how broadband – or better broadband – can help them achieve their goals. Do you have plans for applications that will support needs? What services can broadband support for public institutions? And will the network be able to meet utilization requirements?

Take ownership locally of your region’s future – local stakeholders need hard data and insights to make the right decisions about what kind of community they want to be 5, 10 years down the road – and how broadband helps get you there?

Investing in broadband is NOT just about the financials. It is about creating a “platform for innovation.”

It’s easy to see the immediate benefits that broadband will bring – be it needs that are blatantly apparent or discovered through assessment. What is not always as immediately evident is the long term transformational power of a broadband “platform for innovation.” One needs only to look back ten years to see how the world has changed – and the economic and social benefits that have accompanied this change – when broadband first emerged as a replacement for dial-up.

Looking back through our history, there have been countless – and sometimes unpopular – decisions to make an investment in infrastructure whose benefits would reveal themselves only when it was in place, and for decades to come. Roads, railroads, water and sewer systems, national defense, etc. are all examples of economic drivers that exceeded what could have even been imagined.

The opportunity cost of not having broadband is continued loss of jobs, industry and youth from a community / region – you cannot afford not to have it if you wish to remain relevant and competitive in an increasingly globalized economy.

Only when you stop looking at your broadband project yielding only immediate and finite benefits will you begin to see the true benefits for your community.

Frame the benefits. Measure them. Promote.

While all of the benefits of your network are not immediately measurable – measure what you can – and promote your success! Define success is measurable, tangible metrics – not with philosophical mumbo jumbo.

By defining goals and the criteria for measuring success, it is possible to collect the data needed for short-term return on investment. All public investments require accountability and transparency, so putting in place up-front monitoring and management process maximizes cost-effectiveness of cost-benefit analysis, but more importantly can leverage these processes and tools to maximize local economic and social benefits. Of course SNG can help you with each and every challenge you may have to ensure your community’s network investment has the measurable impacts and long-term benefits you need.

“Measuring community the broadband community return on investment”

Research from SNG and others (as well as anecdotal experience) has convinced most decision makers that broadband is beneficial. This, along with federal funding and increased policy focus, is fueling a growing interest in taking this “broadband is beneficial” understanding to the next level of depth and practical value – including assessment of “return on investment.”

Here is how broadband contributes to economic growth – beyond “IT jobs”

The economic spill-over benefits from broadband are more far-reaching, although not as obvious, as the typically narrow “direct impacts” that are typically discussed, such as technology sectors, (e.g. “IT jobs”) and e-commerce activities related to B2C and B2B transactions. To understand the full impact of investing in broadband infrastructure and broadband adoption initiatives one needs to look deeper.

Business users quickly understand the broadband-enabled benefits of doing the same things faster: whatever the organization was doing before such as research, communication, or document transfers, etc. can be done more efficiently and reliably. However, the most significant benefits are generated from opportunities whereby businesses and organizations transform their business operations by using broadband-enabled applications to be creative and do things in new ways that were previously not possible, such as adopting new business models, or reaching-out to new markets.

Although it takes time for most businesses and organizations to determine what broadband-enabled changes makes sense for them and to implement the appropriate “e-solutions”. Enterprises that are motivated – by a need or opportunity – will move quickly to take these transformative steps and the others will follow, which is fundamental to productivity and competitiveness. The same dynamic occurs for organizations that may not be driven by revenues, or profits. All organizations that provide some kind of service have staff, internal processes, and interact with suppliers and clients. Organization growth may not be the first priority, however productivity and service delivery remain important drivers.

The three impact waves

The net result of the direct impacts from broadband and the spill-over benefits (indirect and induced impacts) increase overall economic activity. Other positive spill-over effects occur, such as demand for new skills and its implications for the labor force. With increasing adoption of e-solutions the need grows for new skills to implement, maintain, and utilize technology and applications to their full benefits. For example, the use of broadband itself also opens up new possibilities for staff training through online resources that would otherwise be unavailable or costly. This important because of the strong linkage between skills development to productivity and innovation.

What impact on the community?

While some of the increased spending created by broadband will occur outside the community, much of it will stay within the community, increasing the overall strength of the local economy through business retention and expansion. Not only does this enable businesses to compete globally on a more level playing field, but also creates a positive business environment to attract new businesses. The creation of new jobs is not only good for those employed, but it also reduces the risk of population decline and can attract high-paying jobs to the community.

Introducing the “community return on investment”

Traditionally, and when left to the private sector, decisions to invest in broadband networks have been based on the typical business case of subscriber revenues generating an ongoing operating profit. We certainly cannot blame service providers for that decision-making criteria – it is their business to make a profit and to choose wisely where to make their investments. Unfortunately, this is also the reason that many communities still do not have sufficient broadband availability – sometimes the business case just does not work for the service provider. When we look beyond the traditional business case and examine the economic impacts from broadband investments we get a very different picture. SNG research has shown that the economic return can be up to 10 times the amount invested in broadband networks. The challenge is how to bridge the gap between the profit-driven decisions of those that build networks and the investments needed to achieve the economic impact potential of broadband.

Increasingly, the answer is coming through public policy interventions at various levels of government, often accompanied by funds to stimulate investment in broadband infrastructure. The underpinning of such public investments needs to be the belief and the confidence that broadband is essential for maintaining business competitiveness and productivity and for enabling economic growth, as well as the numerous social benefits such as enhanced delivery of health and education services. Governments of many countries and regions are taking the leadership to undertake or facilitate investments in broadband in recognition of its economic impact potential – which can actually be measured.

Recent example

Businesses and organizations do increase revenues, reduce costs, and create jobs as a result of using broadband, and they are able to tell us that. For example, in a recent study, we found an 11% average 12-month increase in employment across 221 US organizations directly as a result of using fiber access for their operations. Over 63% of businesses said that their use of fiber was important for increasing sales and 179 establishments generated a total of $3.3M in additional revenue through fiber use. The majority of these impacts occurred in the second and third year after using fiber, reflecting the reality that it takes some time for businesses to integrate new broadband applications into their operations and to see their impact. Such direct impacts create spin-off effects across the rest of the local economy, often at a factor of 2 to 3 times the direct impacts.

Where investments in broadband are made with the goal of stimulating economic activity it is both essential and possible to measure the outcomes from those investments. It is equally essential to invest not only in broadband infrastructure, but also in providing a support and learning infrastructure to assist organizations in effectively adopting and utilizing e-solutions. Combined, broadband infrastructure and skills development generate the direct impacts for their business and the spill-over benefits for their communities. It is only through broad and effective utilization of broadband that economic benefits can be realized.

By Gary Dunmore, SNG

Click here to download this SNG position paper

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