Visionary commits $100m to build out fiber internet in Wyoming and Colorado

GILLETTE — There’s a very fine line between being patient and waiting for the right time to strike while also looking ahead to make sure one doesn’t get left behind.
That’s the tightrope Visionary Broadband has had to walk, but it seems to have paid off. The Gillette-based internet service provider has committed $100 million to build fiber in Wyoming, Montana and Colorado.
Fiber-optic internet, or fiber, is a broadband connection that hits speeds of 1 gigabit per second.
Brian Worthen, CEO of Visionary Broadband, said this has been in the works for two years, getting the financing lined up, picking the right markets and proving they could do it on a smaller scale before making the big announcement.
“We spent the last 24 months learning and putting together our financing, and now we’re ready to pounce,” he said.
Visionary has about 40 miles of fiber around Gillette, and it’s built out fiber in Torrington, LaGrange, Dayton, Ranchester and Yoder, as well as in Kremmling, Colorado.
“We wanted to show some success, rather than make an announcement and have nothing to show for it,” he said.
It’s an exciting time, Worthen said. 
Fiber infrastructure is becoming a key element of economic development to “attract and keep young working families and businesses.”
Earlier this year, Visionary announced it had received an investment from GTCR, a private equity firm based in Chicago, to build new fiber networks in the region and help with match requirements for grant programs.
Construction is underway in Gillette, Casper, Cheyenne and Lusk, with go-live dates starting in early 2023 for some residential customers.
Visionary also is building business fiber in Laramie, Lander and Wheatland, with plans to expand to residential areas of those communities in 2024.
In Gillette, the fiber buildout will happen one neighborhood at a time, Worthen said. He estimated the entire project will take three years to complete here.
With fiber, Visionary will offer gigabit service, or 1 gigabit per second, with all equipment supporting speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second, to every home and business within its service area.
The company plans to expand fiber internet to 11 additional communities in the next few years.

While it’s good business practice to move into a market that offers the best return on investment, Worthen said this wasn’t the only thing behind deciding which communities to build fiber in.
“It’d be easy to pick dots on a map based on ROI (return on investment) only, but we looked at more than that, we looked at the relationships we have,” he said. “A big part of our business is to focus on areas where we have a strong relationship with the stakeholders and community government.”
This summer, the Gillette City Council entered into a franchise agreement with Visionary, which will allow the company to more easily roll out fiber internet homes in Gillette.
One of the biggest things Visionary learned in the last two years was to adapt to the supply chain issues, Worthen said. They were having to wait half a year or even up to a year for certain pieces of equipment to come in.
“Our biggest learning curve was engineering our network to change to a different product that’s more readily available,” he said.
Additionally, Visionary has secured federal, state and local grants to assist in fiber builds in Cañon City, Lake City, Marble and Walden, Colorado, as well as Hardin, Montana.
The timing has worked in Visionary’s favor. Worthen said the equipment in the fiber industry recently changed from supporting 1 gig per second to 10 gigs, so the fiber that Visionary will install should last for quite a while.
“Fortunately for us, we’re just now entering this phase of our business so we aren’t having to upgrade older equipment,” he said. “All of the equipment is going in fresh. It’s really future-proofing Gillette.”
Technology has made an “immense” jump in the past few years, he said. Five years ago, an internet provider would be feeding an entire community with 10 gigabit internet. Now, it will soon be used for individual businesses and homes.
Worthen said this is not much different from widening of an existing road to include more lanes.
“(Fiber) is a 20-lane road,” he said.
Pivot Visionary was started in 1994 by Clay Cundy, Jeremy Malli and Malcolm Shepard, three Campbell County High School graduates.
In the late 1990s, Visionary had 20,000 dial-up internet users across Wyoming. It was making good money. But in 2001, it pivoted and began developing a broadband internet platform.
It’s changed directions several times since then, and it’s currently in the middle of its seventh pivot.
In 2017, Visionary shifted away from wholesale internet. That year, Mammoth Networks, Visionary’s wholesale division outside of Wyoming, had 240 customers all over the country, including Texas, Illinois, Georgia and Massachusetts.
Worthen and his team made the decision to get rid of the wholesale division, where it was using other companies’ networks. Instead, it started to build its own network.
While it cost more upfront, the move has paid off, Worthen said. If the company hadn’t made this pivot, Visionary would be in a situation where its profitability would be decreasing.
“It would be hard to reinvest and build additional staff and projects,” he said. “We just would’ve been squeezed out of the business over time.”
Back in 2017, Visionary had between 50 and 60 employees. Today, it’s grown to about 210, and about half of them live in Gillette. Visionary also has offices in Sheridan and Cañon City, Colorado.
“It’s a little surreal thinking we’re able to accomplish this and get out of that stage that most providers were in, where they became less relevant over time,” he said.
Fiber is the present, but it also is the future, Worthen said. 
TV is delivered to homes through fiber. It’s used by mobile networks, and oil wells are monitored through fiber. The applications are nearly endless.
“This is a good time for our business, because the entire world is converging onto fiber,” he said. “But it’s hard for me to say right now exactly how everybody’s going to use this in the future.”
In five years, Worthen hopes to expand Visionary into other markets.
As for right now, it’s an interesting place to be, he said. Visionary’s publicly-owned competitors are subject to both the performance of the stock market and investors who are hesitant about expansion.
“The marketplace is so topsy-turvy right now, it’s a great opportunity for us,” he said. “I’m a big fan of luck. I do think in business, if you work hard, the lucky opportunities will come.”
 
 
This story was published on Dec. 6, 2022.