Thursday, January 25, 2018

Santa Maria To Get High Speed Fiber, Hopes To Attract Tech Companies

The City of Santa Maria is set to get a high speed, gigabit Internet in a deal with Wave Broadband, Wave said today, after the fiber internet provider signed a deal to complete construction of a fiber-optic network ring in the city. Financial details of the deal were not announced, but according to Wave Broadband, the new high speed gigabit fiber is expected to provide service to city departments, businesses, schools, and residents. Santa Maria--on California's Central Coast--is hoping the availability of very high speed Internet will specifically attract new tech companies and employees, who require high speed internet service. According to Santa Maria and Wave Broadband, the city sees the project as "essential" to the community's economic expansion. Santa Maria is midway between Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo. Although that segment of the Central Coast is not well known for technology startups, in recent years, the area has produced such successful companies as Mindbody Software, which had an IPO 2015. Mindbody is in San Luis Obispo.