The high-fibre count network build, which will have diverse connections and backhaul capabilities, involves multiple anchor contracts that will provide a backbone to carriers, enterprises and data centres requiring increasing amounts of bandwidth.
More than 1,200 route miles of the fibre will be laid in Tampa, the second largest city in Florida and fourth largest metro area in the southeastern US, with the rest of the fibre installation taking place in the state’s theme park city hotspot of Orlando.
“Central Florida has a growing number of innovators and diverse business ecosystems that require high-speed fibre bandwidth to fuel their businesses,” said Steve Orlando, senior vice president of Central Region at Zayo. “With Zayo’s dense network, extensive construction experience and strong jurisdictional relationships, Zayo is well-positioned to provide customers in Tampa and Orlando with best-in-class infrastructure.”
Tampa’s demand for fibre comes from health care, education, enterprise and data centre companies that require high-speed network connectivity and access to cloud service providers.
Orlando is among the nation’s high-growth markets, ranking sixth in the country for job growth and among the top markets for population growth. Professional services, education, health care, leisure and hospitality services are all driving business growth.
“We are excited about our investment in central Florida, including the opportunity to employ and resource the project as much as possible locally,” commented Jack Waters, president of Zayo Networks and COO. “We look forward to giving enterprise businesses a differentiated, diverse option for reliable, high-speed data connectivity to the world.”
Zayo Group is also making significant investments in its metro fibre infrastructure in Ohio.