Merit Network scores $69.6M grant to expand broadband in UP

Wednesday, August 25, 2010 | Source: Concentrate

When Merit Network counts the money from the grants it receives, it takes six zeros off the end to make the math easier. The Ann Arbor-based non-profit recently received a $69.6 million federal grant on top of the $33 million federal stimulus grant it received earlier this year.

The latest federal grant (thanks, federal stimulus) will pay for spreading high-speed Internet across Michigan's Upper Peninsula and much of its northern Lower Peninsula. That should add up to 1,000 miles of fiber-optic infrastructure across 29 counties. The idea is to help create more economic opportunity in these rural areas by increasing access to the Internet.

"We're trying to push this economic development into rural areas," says Elwood Downing, vice president of member relations & communications for Merit Network. "We're trying to create that economic benefit across the whole state."

The Ann Arbor-based non-profit manages high-bandwidth communication lines between the major universities in the Midwest, in cities like Ann Arbor, Chicago and Detroit. It has a staff of about 77 people and five interns from the likes of the University of Michigan and Eastern Michigan University. It has hired at least 10 people in the last year and has four positions that are either being filled or are about to be filled.

"We're looking at a minimum of at least six new staff," Downing says. "At least one of them will be a remote commuter from the northern part of the state."

Source: Elwood Downing, vice president of member relations & communications for Merit Network
Writer: Jon Zemke