U.S. communities are on divergent trajectories. Some experience job creation, population growth, and increasing wealth per capita. For others, opportunity is stunted and vitality is in danger—with crumbling infrastructure, shrinking workforces, high unemployment, and lower educational attainment. These communities are at risk of never catching up.
Investment in critical infrastructure is the single most addressable difference between communities on these opposing trajectories.
Intelligent infrastructure—built on a foundation of open access fiber—is the critical underpinning for every vibrant, resilient community. Open access fiber networks power ultra-fast access to information, a competitive market for content and services, job formation and re-skilling for workers, distributed healthcare services, new wireless solutions, and resilient modern infrastructure including responsible energy systems. And this is all possible on a single network, without inefficient and duplicative infrastructure over-build.
The inertia & why we’re here
Today, a complex multi-factor inertia reinforces and steepens these divergent trajectories—cementing the harmful status quo for many communities outside the mega cities.
- We function in a polarized political environment that largely prevents bipartisan action at the federal level
- We’re stuck in an intellectual and capital malaise, born from decades of macro prosperity
- Communities across the country are ready for action, but they face growing funding gaps alongside deteriorating municipal credit and pension funding crises
- Communities across the country are ready for action, but a unifying national model has yet to arise—in part, as a result of incumbent lobbying and misinformation campaigns
- Communities are distrustful of institutional, “Wall Street”, sources of scale capital
We started Underline because we cannot accept this status quo for another day.
We are here to move beyond this status quo and ensure the vibrancy of our nation through building intelligent community infrastructure.
What we’re doing
We design, finance, construct, and operate open access community fiber-optic networks.
Connected systems underline our world. They help us keep up with our favorite shows and our friends, our work and our homework. They empower us to open new businesses, create new opportunities, and advance as a society. And in the future, their power, and their necessity, will only be amplified.
With the changing economic landscape, and a growing funding gap, local governments are under more pressure than ever to create opportunities for residents.
Some communities have the foundation to thrive in a world like this, and some are closed off from it: closed off from the ability to build modern infrastructure; closed off from creating opportunity; closed off from participating in the global economy; closed off from a vibrant future.
We put private capital to work, hand-in-hand with communities, to deliver essential intelligent infrastructure—starting with the open access fiber networks that underline everything else.
How we do it
We use proprietary data science to guide project origination and design, digital engagement tools to accelerate community demand, intelligent deployment technologies to produce future-ready results, and innovative capital structures to fund the projects—all infused with an ethic of community partnership and social purpose.
Then, the open access model is central to our solution: it opens the choices available to residents and business owners; it opens the market for new service providers to compete; and it opens the process for community leaders to define the network they need.
Only on open access networks can multiple services and service providers operate on shared infrastructure. As a result, service providers can enter new markets without large capital expenditure, and consumers experience greater choice, better service, and lower prices. Neutral infrastructure—independent from any single service provider— is also critical for communities looking to provide new public services, deploy modern wireless solutions, and build “smart city” infrastructure.
With open-access fiber networks, communities will be open to what the future holds: new entertainment options, more business formation, remote learning and job training opportunities, distributed healthcare solutions, and efficient water systems.
We are here to open the possibilities of tomorrow—to underline the vitality of every community in the country.