Company to offer wireless Internet (12/1/04)

A company backed by a loan of economic development income tax funds plans to begin offering high-speed wireless Internet service in Jay County before Jan. 1.

Officials from Omnicity Inc., an Indianapolis-based telecommunications company, announced the timetable Tuesday morning at a “marketing event” at the Jay County Courthouse.

Plans call for service to be established in and around Portland first, followed a short time later by service for the Redkey/Dunkirk area. The equipment installed by the company has a normal effective range of five or six miles, with longer distances possible.

Plans are to eventually provide service to all of Jay County.

“We are looking forward to being a part of Portland and the Jay County community,” Michael Early, CEO/chairman of Omnicity, told 30 or so members of the public Tuesday in the courthouse auditorium.

“We’re looking forward to helping make sure ... you have high-speed Internet services.”

In September, Jay County Commissioners approved establishing a line of credit of up to $380,000 for use by the company, which will offer a range of connection speeds.

Early said developing private-public partnerships is a key to solving connection problems.

Fees for residential Internet service will range from $22.95 to $37.95 per month, while business fees will range from $34.95 for a home office to $174.95 for a large office.

Purchase or lease of a modem/antenna will also be required at a cost of $270 to purchase or $7 per month to lease. Early also pointed out that the modem is portable, meaning it can be used with a laptop computer anywhere within range of an Omnicity tower.

There is an activation fee of $75. That fee is being waived for the first 100 customers who sign up for service.

Orders will be taken beginning Dec. 15.

Early answered several questions regarding reliability, range, bandwidths offered and connection issues.

The range of connection speeds range from the equivalent of digital subscriber lines (DSL), about 256 kilobytes per second, to 1 megabyte per second or more, which is as fast or faster than a T-1 line.

A line of sight to a relay tower is not required, Early said, although in some cases a small external indoor antenna — or even a larger outdoor version — may be required.

Early said Tuesday that Omnicity is close to signing contracts to install its transmitting equipment on towers in the Portland and Redkey/Dunkirk areas.

He said the preference of the company is to install equipment on pre-existing towers — not to build its own towers.

Early said one of the advantages of wireless Internet service is that the bandwidth, or signal, to each subscriber is not divided, or split.

The signal is transmitted by radio frequency and is not affected by weather conditions, Early said.

Bob Quadrozzi, executive director of Jay County Development Corporation, said Tuesday that improving telecommunications capabilities was a goal of a 1998 strategic development plan adopted by JCDC.

Quadrozzi and a JCDC technology committee explored several options before choosing to work with Omnicity.

Omnicity, which began research and development in 2001, currently serves customers in Rush County and in and around Westfield, north of Indianapolis.

The company’s goal is to provide broadband Internet service to communities which may be currently lacking that service.

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For more information, phone (877) 666-4248 or log on to www.omnicity.net.[[In-content Ad]]