Arctic O&G Directory Fall 2020 - GCI launches Alaska’s first 5G network in Anchorage

Company aims high, taking Alaska from the Last Frontier to the First Frontier

Petroleum News

Q. What is the official name of your company?

A. GCI

Q. What do you most want people to know about your company?

A. GCI recognizes the importance of responsible resource development, and specifically how important the oil and gas industry is to Alaskans and a healthy state economy. GCI’s long-term focus on network infrastructure across the state puts the company in a unique position to support the urban, rural and remote industrial needs of Alaska.

Q. Where is your company located?

A. GCI is headquartered in Anchorage, AK with employees located across the state.

Q. What year was the company founded and by whom?

A. GCI was founded in 1979 by Ron Duncan and Bob Walp.

Q. What is your company’s primary business activity?

A. GCI provides technology solutions to meet the complex challenges facing Alaska’s energy sector. GCI’s resilient fiber and LTE networks, including the only redundant fiberoptic network to the North Slope, help clients meet growing highspeed bandwidth needs.

Q. Are there important projects the company is currently a part of or has done recently?

A. Earlier this year, GCI delivered the first true 5G wireless service in the state, beginning with Anchorage. GCI’s 5G project has not only delivered the first standards-based 5G network to Anchorage but has also improved 4G LTE speeds for all GCI wireless customers across the city.

That means GCI customers don’t need a 5G phone to get the benefits of GCI’s next generation network upgrades. When the 5G wireless project is completed, every sector of each cell site will be outfitted with five radios to utilize GCI’s low-band and mid-band radio spectrum, driving massive improvements in speed and coverage, particularly in-building coverage. GCI’s fiber network, the backbone of the project, will deliver broadband connectivity to each of the upgraded cell sites.

GCI’s new, vastly more capable network will operate five times faster than before, and it will serve as the blueprint for GCI’s network modernization efforts in other Alaska cities.

Q. How many employees does your company have?

A. 2,000 employees

Q. Is the company changing any of its services or products?

A. GCI, as a technology company, continually develops new products to meet the ever-changing technology needs of its customers.

Q. What is your company’s main strength or its edge over the competition?

A. GCI is committed to bringing the levels of connectivity necessary to its oil and gas customers so that all industry-specific applications, whether cloud-based or local, can be utilized when needed. The GCI team listens to the needs of its clients and brings solutions tailored to meet their current and future needs. Our philosophy focuses on detailed planning, integration, agility and customer enablement. We see this need growing significantly as the digitization of oilfield operations continue to transform the industry.

GCI also has access to the best engineers and technicians in the state who can design and maintain complex networks over multiple facilities, including fiber, coax, wireless, satellite and microwave. This team of professional telecom engineers, project managers, and industrial telecom technicians collectively have over 250+ years of experience in infrastructure design, construction, commissioning, and support in remote environments across the world

Q. What is the most challenging work/contract the company has undertaken?

A. The TERRA network is among the most challenging projects GCI has undertaken. Completed in 2017, GCI’s TERRA network delivers high-speed broadband connectivity to 45,000 Alaskans in 84 rural communities in Western and Northwest Alaska. The $300 million TERRA network consists of sections of fiber optic cable coupled with more than 100 microwave towers stretching more than 3,300 miles, which, if measured out, is larger than the state of Texas. Construction relied on heavy-lifting helicopters to deliver tower equipment, tools and steel to remote areas.

But the work didn’t stop there. With 22 TERRA towers located on remote mountain tops, GCI relies on generators to keep the equipment online 24/7/365. Keeping those generators running year-round requires a massive annual refueling effort, where GCI crews and contractors ferry enough fuel to keep the sites online for 15 months at a time. The refueling effort is critical in order to power the network that keeps Western and Northwest Alaska clinics, schools and community residents connected.

Q. What are the biggest obstacles to completing work your company undertakes?

A. Short construction seasons, challenging logistics in rural Alaska, harsh Alaska weather conditions, and a limited local talent resource pool.

Q. What do you see as your company’s biggest challenge in the next five years?

A. The health of the state’s economy – we have been operating in a recession for multiple years now and it shows no sign of ending. This has a direct impact of the health of GCI and of all our customers in the energy & mining sectors.

Q. What is your company’s safety record? What steps does the company take to ensure a safe work environment?

A. Safety is a core value of the GCI team. Nowhere is this focus more apparent than the success of our team achieving 3.2 million employee hours without a lost time accident, as well as 2 million hours since our last recordable incident in support of oil, gas, and mining.

Q. Has your company been involved in any community projects or charity events?

A. GCI is one of Alaska’s leaders in corporate philanthropy, donating approximately $2 million each year in cash, products and connectivity to organizations across the state. GCI is committed to giving back to the communities it serves and provides employees with 16 hours of paid leave to volunteer with local organizations. In 2019, nearly 550 GCI employees volunteered more than 5,300 hours.

Q. What is the address of your company’s Web site?

A. https://www.gci.com/business/solutions/energy