Wednesday Bytes: Arelion, Infinera, Zayo, 123NET, Compass

An upgrade, a set of rural and middle mile funding wins, and a bit of data center M&A:

Arelion continues to invest in its US network footprint. They have tapped Infinera’s FlexILS flexible-grid line system to take advantage of the L-band between Ashburn and Atlanta. The upgrade will double Arelion’s available capacity on this key route. We had Arelion’s Mattias Fridström here for an Industry Spotlight last month to talk about the company’s approach to its global network infrastructure.

Zayo has picked up $92.9M worth of NITA awards for three middle mile projects. The projects include 420 route miles around Reno in the states of CA, OR, and NV, 644 route miles in Texas between El Paso and Dallas, and 822 route miles of exit ramps along its existing route between Dallas and Atlanta. The funds will enable better connectivity options in rural markets that would be otherwise hard to justify expansion into.

123NET followed up its joint win alongside PFN the other day with one of its own. They have picked up backing from the ROBIN Grant and some ARPA funds to build out 1,100 route miles of fiber in Michigan’s Allegan County, which sits along Lake Michigan to the southwest of Grand Rapids. The $65M project will include $17.5M from 123NET’s own coffers, and construction is expected to begin in August of this year.

And there was a bit of data center M&A yesterday of note. Compass Data Centers is changing hands, as Brookfield Infrastructure and the existing investors at Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan have entered into a definite agreement to acquire the company from Redbird Capital Partners and the Azrieli Group. Compass operates data centers in 9 US markets, 2 Canadian markets, and one campus over in the Italian city of Milan.

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Categories: Datacenter · Fiber Networks · FTTH · Metro fiber · Telecom Equipment