Direct Communications is a family owned and operated rural telecom provider with roots going back to 1951 when Lee May bought Rockland Telephone from T. H. Bell, future Secretary of Education under President Ronald Reagan.  Lee ran the company until 1977 when he sold Rockland Telephone to his son Leonard May.  Upon assuming ownership of Rockland Telephone, Leonard executed plant upgrades to the network to make Rockland Telephone a state of the art telephone network, including being the first independent telephone company to install a digital switch.

In the 1990’s Rockland Telephone changed its name to Direct Communications Rockland and along with its non-regulated affiliate, Direct Communications Star West, began to grow both vertically and horizontally.  Direct Communications Star West first launched a satellite entertainment franchise in 1993.  It then began to provide Internet Services in 1996 with deploying high speed broadband by 2000.  Direct Communications Rockland acquired another telephone exchange in Southern Bear Lake County that moved its subscriber count to 1500. 

Direct Communications involvement with the City of Eagle Mountain began in 2000 when Leonard May was introduced to the City’s Telecom System Administrator, Dan Valentine, at a telecommunications event.  Direct then offered its expertise and help to the fledgling system as it endeavored to purchase a billing and accounting system.  The relationship began to grow and as Direct Communications became involved with the City of Eagle Mountain, Direct could see the opportunities for business growth in this area.

Direct Communications began its official interest in acquiring the City of Eagle Mountain’s Municipal Telecom System in November, 2001.  With the election of Mayor Kelvin Bailey it became clear that the City of Eagle Mountain was deeply interested in selling its Telecom System to a potential buyer.  As a consequence of Direct Communications’ relationship it approached the City to make it clear that it was interested in evaluating if an acquisition would be mutually beneficial.  Direct Communications and the City of Eagle Mountain entered into an intent to purchase agreement in November, 2001 and began the necessary regulatory and financial work to consummate the acquisition.

The first step was to come to a conclusion of what a fair market value for the system was.  Per the City Ordinance this was necessary for the City to sell any utility.  This was performed and a target price was established.  After the target price was established the motion to sell the Telecom System was taken to the voters of Eagle Mountain who overwhelmingly, 96% in favor of, approved the sale to Direct Communications.

The next step was to identify exactly what assets comprised the Telecom System.  As a consequence of the rapid growth and the bifurcated construction obligations between the City of Eagle Mountain and the Sub-Developers, the network records were lacking.  Direct Communications contracted with a local telecom engineering company to evaluate the plant assets and asses its value.  This process took the entire year of 2003.

In 2004 Direct Communications was comfortable approaching the Utah Public Service Commission seeking a Certificate of Convenience and Necessity that would allow it to be a regulated telecom provider in Eagle Mountain.  Through the year of 2004 Direct filed its petition and was involved in various technical conferences and open hearings as the Utah Public Services Commission evaluated if the acquisition was in the public interest.  The Utah Public Services Commission ruled that the acquisition was in the public interest and the new corporation, Direct Communications Cedar Valley, was set to begin operations once the Federal Communications Commission recognized it as an eligible telecommunications carrier.

Direct Communications Cedar Valley filed a docket to become a fully recognized eligible telecommunications carrier in the fall of 2004.  As things frequently go with governmental agencies it took some time for the FCC to analyze the findings of the Utah PSC and the filings from both Qwest and Direct Communications.  With the help of Utah’s Congressional Delegation, led by Senator Orrin Hatch, the FCC finally ruled in November, 2005 that Direct Communications Cedar Valley could serve as an eligible telecommunications carrier and awarded it the exchange area of Eagle Mountain.  With that ruling the City of Eagle Mountain and Direct Communications chose to consummate the acquisition on 01 February, 2006 and on that day Direct Communications officially took ownership and responsibility for operations at Eagle Mountain.

At a signing ceremony with the city council and mayor present, Direct Communications presented the City of Eagle Mountain a check for $6.3 million for the purchase of the former Eagle Mountain Telecom network. For pictures of that event, see http://www.directcom.com/eaglemtn/images/community/telecom-sale/index.htm

One of the first positive steps Direct Communications took in bringing the local communications service in line with industry standards was to decrease DSL prices. The cost of building and maintaining the network would have driven the city steadily towards bankruptcy, and with no federal cost recovery structures in place, the city had to charge exorbitant prices to try recover costs on its network.  Before DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS bought the network in 2006, residents who wanted DSL had to pay the city a $250 install fee and 1.5 Meg DSL service was $100 a month. DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS introduced a 256kb DSL package at a starting rate of $29.95 per month, with the installation fee being waived with a 1-year commitment. During 2006 DSL subscribership in Eagle Mountain more than doubled.  

The most important change that has taken place since Direct Communications assumed ownership is the investment in new technology, and investment in the local network. Each year since 2006, DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS has invested several millions of dollars into the network plant. Immediately after the sale, DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS began significant network upgrades to ensure that the telecommunications network in Eagle Mountain was the most state of the art and robust network along the Wasatch Front.  DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS began laying Fiber-to-the-home in most new sub-developments. With significant capital investment in fiber optic deployment to the customer’s premises, new redundant fiber optic routes to connect to all the major carriers in Salt Lake City and new electronic equipment, Direct Communications was ensuring that no other Wasatch Front community could provide the same connectivity as Eagle Mountain can.

Direct Communication’s state of the art FIBER OPTIC network offered 2 major advantages:
Bandwidth
Direct Communications has direct fiber optic connectivity to all the major carriers in Salt Lake City.  This provides the option of  multi-Gigabit connections.  It is total fiber all the way.
Redundancy
By 2009, Direct Communications had deployed 3 separate fiber optic routes to connect the fiber optic network in Eagle Mountain to the world.  This means that if one fiber optic route is cut, instantly the traffic will be seamlessly routed on one of the other two routes.  This ensures the protection and integrity of a business’ telecommunications information.

2007 and 2008 were watershed years for the telecommunications industry as a whole, as more homes began to substitute traditional landline phone service with wireless service only. DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS management soon predicted that in order to compete effectively in the wake of industry trends, the most important service for the future was broadband, and specifically, how much bandwidth a company could deliver. These years were spent trying to evolve, build and prepare the network for massive future broadband deployment over fiber. DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS purchased a new digital switch in 2008, and invested several millions in new fiber optic cable and digital equipment. DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS also introduced their first real product bundle which included local phone, calling features, 350 minutes of long distance, and 3Mb DSL for $89.95. They also successfully petitioned the Utah PUC to lower residential phone prices in Eagle Mountain by $1, to $16.50 per line.

2009
Our efforts to position ourselves as the future of broadband technology began with an overhaul of our broadband offering in Utah, where we upgraded our packages to new speeds ranging from 3Mb to 20Mb. This was made possible by a positive development in the federal regulation of local telephone networks, along with the completion of major new fiber routes going out of Eagle Mountain, which allowed Direct Communications to offer the first true 20Mb connection to homes on fiber optic cable in Eagle Mountain. DIRECT COMMUNICATIONS was now even offering homes on copper speeds of up to 12Mb. The smallest broadband package on offer was now 3Mb.

Kip Wilson, general manager of the Utah property,  also came up with a revolutionary idea of offering a bare-bones landline service with only 10 minutes of measured service, and unlimited 911 calling, which was branded e-phone, or emergency phone, for only $1 excluding taxes. Since the market was moving away from regular landline anyway, ephone was a way to remain competitive in the changing market, because people could have the safety of a landline, with the vital benefit of still paying bundled rates for our broadband service, which was the key to our long-term strategy of becoming the only real choice for serious broadband services. After seeing a couple of years of declining landline subscription, this year was a new dawn for Direct Communications Cedar Valley, and our market share steadily began to grow again.

In January 2009, Direct Communications led the rural telecom industry in the launch of a new low-cost landline choice, called emergency phone, or ephone, by Direct Communications. This was a regular landline, but without the unlimited calling. The service is free. All you pay is some of the taxes and fees associated with regular phone service.
What do I get with e-phone?
Unlimited 911 calling.
500 minutes incoming calling.
10 minutes local outgoing calling.
Unlimited calls to the phone office.
Directory assistance.
Operator Service.
Overage minutes are only 10c per minute. (Compare that your cell phone.)
Ability to make long-distance calls. (At regular long-distance rates.)

What are the benefits of e-phone?
Get the fastest broadband service in Eagle Mountain at a lower price because it’s in a bundle.
Peace of mind knowing you will have a phone that works in an emergency.
911 services will find your home.
A local 789 home phone number to give out when you don’t want to list your mobile phone number.
A safety phone for your kids and babysitter to use from your home.
Incoming calling minutes to offset high usage on your cell phone plan. 

In Idaho, we expanded our state-wide fiber network, offering fiber-to-the-premises to retail and wholesale customers.

In April, we opened a new community center in Oxford, Idaho, with 10 computers and high-speed internet available for free public use, to add to our outreach program which already included another 10-computer community center in Paris, Idaho.

Direct Communications was featured in the September 2009 issue of Rural Telecom, the NTCA’s official industry publication, in an article titled “Emergency: How One Telco Turned The Tide With Young Customers,” explaining how we had met the needs of our customers and had grown our subscriber base with the ephone. This article led to a number of inquiries from other rural telcos all over the country wanting to know more about our offering.

2010
2010 was another year of growth in Eagle Mountain for Direct Communications, where we defied all landline industry loss trends and saw a growth of 14% in our landline subs. This was remarkable especially considering the stagnant housing market. This growth was accompanied by a 30% growth in the number of broadband subscribers.

Our priorities for the year were to win back market share by leveraging our superior fiber-optic broadband service, and migrate current customers to higher bandwidth.
We felt that to focus on our competitive advantage of being able to provide more bandwidth, we had to offer an improved online experience to the customer and show people how they could do more online with us versus our competitors, so we focused all our marketing on applications.

We felt we could increase broadband subscribers by becoming the primary source of entertainment in the home. Xbox was a perfect promotional item for that marketing strategy. Our unique competitive advantage is that as the only wire-line broadband provider in the area, we are able to provide the higher speeds and unlimited bandwidth needed for high definition video streaming. Our wireless competitors fear streaming—we needed to encourage it. Besides gaming systems, we later gave away Apple TV players and also began to offer ESPN3.com to our customers.
We also improved incentives on refer-a-friend program to $100 per referral, which tripled the number of customer referrals compared to the precious years.

Direct Communications was invited to present our story at several telecommunications industry events around the country and explain how we market emergency phone service. We presented at the Fall NTCA Conference in St Louis, and again at the Winter OPASTCO Conference in Miami, the Zone/ANPI Conference in Park City, and the Utah Rural Telecom Conference in St George. The most fascinating aspect of our story to out-of-state companies appeared to be the unique demographics of Utah County, and the overwhelming proportion of young families in the area.

In Utah we launched our first unlimited long distance offering, and an all-VOIP digital phone product.

In Idaho we launched Amped Up Wireless in the Pocatello area, which offered the first 3Mb upload to residential customers, so we marketed that as the fastest upload speed in Idaho, with a symmetrical 3mb up and down at $34.95 and a 7Mb down/3mb Up for $44.95. We tried to focus on more tech-savvy consumers with high bandwidth needs—gamers, people who work from home etc. We tried to partner with the school districts on our launch. On October 25, 2010, Direct Communications donated $1000.00 to School District 25.  This was in conjunction with a June 25, 2010, Direct Communications fundraiser for local education.  Direct Communications introduced Amped Up Wireless in the area, and pledged to donate $100.00 for each new install of the product during the launch. This story was covered by KPVI News 6, who aired a segment on the 6pm news about the donation. To see the video, visit:http://www.kpvi.com/story.php?id=30362&n=15206
We opened a new retail location in Pocatello on Yellowstone Ave, described at Direct Communications Makes a Move. We tried to become more involved in the Pocatello community, becoming active in the local Pocatello chamber of commerce and hosting booths at the Bring Your Own Business Fair, Idaho Spring Fair, Family Fun Day, and Chubbuck Days. We also had booths at the Franklin County Fair, the Bear Lake County Fair, Caribou County Fair, Pony Express Days, , and Eastern Idaho State Fair.

We ventured in the new world of corporate social media, launching our first corporate blog, YouTube Channel and Facebook pages.

We began major upgrades to our cable network, starting in Montpelier, so that we could offer 10Mb speeds.

2011