Jackson, Tennessee-based Aeneas Internet and Telephone is partnering with Chickasaw Electric Cooperative (CEC) to bring high-speed fiber internet to parts of Fayette County in 2024.
That’s part of Aeneas’ mission to enhance connectivity in underserved, rural segments of West Tennessee by bringing internet to areas that are currently in the CEC service region.
Aeneas, a telecommunications company with about 35 employees, and Chickasaw began those efforts in the Dancyville area, where residents and businesses can soon benefit from gigabit internet speeds and more reliable telephone services. With the work in Dancyville completed, Aeneas is now accepting orders on service.
Aeneas CEO Stephen Thorpe spoke about the challenges for residents and businesses that don’t reside in more metro areas of Fayette County, including Oakland, and often have little to no internet access. He said Aeneas learned a lot during Covid about the need for broadband services in these rural areas, which gives residents greater access to jobs and other things like telemedicine.
“The only access to internet services they have is maybe a hotspot through a cellphone company. They limit you on how much data you can use,” Thorpe said. “It’s very expensive. It can be slow at times. Or satellite internet, which is the same thing, can limit you on the amount of data you use and is quite cost prohibitive. So bringing a fiber-optic connection to these communities, they’ll have access to gigabit services that anyone in Memphis or anywhere in the country can have. You could live out on a farm with a half-mile driveway and still have access to broadband services.”
Aeneas received $3.6 million in grant money for the Dancyville buildout, with CEC receiving $16 million to build out the fiber infrastructure in the rest of Fayette County. After Dancyville, other parts of Fayette County are expected to be completed gradually throughout 2024.
Aeneas was founded in 1995 and offers various services, including gigabit-fiber broadband, local phone service, VoIP, office phone systems, corporate email, network security, off-site file storage, data center services, managed networking, and other services. In addition to partnering with CEC on this specific project, Aeneas has worked with Southwest Tennessee Electric and Bolivar Energy Authority in recent years to bring broadband internet to other underserved areas in West Tennessee, including Henderson, Brownsville, and Toone.
Thorpe said increased broadband access in these communities should “streamline” things for businesses.
“If they have high-speed access, they can utilize a lot of the newer software that’s mainly online now for business applications [and] accounting,” he said. “We’re a phone company, so we provide phone systems for folks that are over the internet. So we’re able to cut costs for businesses across the board, whether for their internet services or phone services, we can do that a lot cheaper because of that high-speed broadband connection now.”
He also called the new internet access coming to these communities “future-proof.”
“Today, a two-gigabit service is more than anyone can need at this moment, but that will change tomorrow,” Thorpe said. The fiber networks will allow us to swap out electronics … and provide the next level of connectivity to West Tennessee. So West Tennessee is in a good spot for growth and will stay on top of technology.”
