Starry Internet is a technology startup that has raised more than $100 million from investors to take on Internet service providers. It used $48 million of those funds to buy 104 licenses from the FCC where it can roll out service across 25 states and roughly 25 million households.
Starry Internet didn't provide a timeline of how long it may take to build out its new Internet network in each city but already has 1.5 million customers in cities such as Boston, Washington D.C., Los Angeles, New York City and Denver.
"We will be building out and deploying more cities through this year and into 2020," a representative for Starry said in a recent email.
The company said network will look different from its competitors since it uses a fixed wireless model where there's a hub and spoke system rather than laying fiber in the ground. In a city such as Baton Rouge, the company would install roughly a dozen or so devices about 80 feet in the air on rooftops or towers.
"Unlike other proposals from incumbents, we do not utilize rights of way or municipal streetlights at the street level for our base stations," the company said.
Starry Internet anticipates to sell 200 megabits per second Internet for $50 per household across the country. Internet speeds of 200 megabits per second could download a high definition YouTube movie clip in two seconds or a film in less than 30 seconds.
The average Internet speed across Louisiana is 34.5 megabits per second and roughly 97% of residents in East Baton Rouge have access to at least 100 megabits per second compared to 91% of residents in West Baton Rouge, according to BroadbandNow.com.
©2019 The Advocate, Baton Rouge, La. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
