Chicago, IL., July 10, 2007 - Sparkplug, Inc. (www.sparkplug.net), a leading provider of fixed wireless business broadband services, today announced its expansion into Las Vegas with the acquisition of wireless broadband and Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services provider Verde Communications. The transaction provides Sparkplug with immediate presence in one of the country’s fastest growing markets and delivers high-speed wireless broadband and VoIP services to businesses throughout Las Vegas, North Las Vegas, Henderson, and Boulder City.
“Expanding into Las Vegas continues our growth, and we found a great fit with Verde Communications,” said Bill Malloy, chief executive officer of Sparkplug. “Sparkplug already has a strong presence in the Southwest with a number of high-capacity data transport customers in Las Vegas. Now with the acquisition of Verde, we can link our networks and provide more business customers with the innovative broadband solutions they need, including dedicated, scalable bandwidth up to GigE speeds to support VoIP, video and other IP solutions that are critical to their success.”
Las Vegas-based Verde Communications is Southern Nevada’s oldest, largest and most experienced commercial wireless broadband provider. The company offers a comprehensive suite of business broadband services including high-speed Internet access, hosting, Virtual Private Networking (VPN), managed services, alternate path redundant broadband and hosted VoIP. Verde Communications founders, Jason Mendenhall and Ben Brimhall, will become part of the Sparkplug management team, and all Verde employees will remain with the company.
“Joining forces with Sparkplug is exciting for both Verde and our business customers throughout the Las Vegas area. Now, we’re in a better position to expand services to our customers as well as increase our large enterprise, carrier and government solutions in the Las Vegas market,” said Jason Mendenhall, president of Verde Communications. “Over the past five years we have delivered fast, affordable broadband solutions to businesses throughout the Las Vegas Valley with a focus on providing new alternative cutting edge technology to our customers. As part of Sparkplug, we’re looking forward to expanding both our network capabilities and the services we offer.”
“Our acquisition of Verde Communications expands our overall footprint and further solidifies our presence in the Southwest region, which extends from Las Vegas to New Mexico, Arizona and Southern California,” said Jeff Hardesty, chief operating officer of Sparkplug. “Our business customers will have broader access to services across the board, particularly for the growing number of organizations that have multiple locations across our service areas.”
One of the nation’s fastest growing metropolitan areas, Las Vegas and the surrounding communities are emerging as an important regional and national business hub as companies move headquarters operations to the area to take advantage of plentiful and cost effective travel and hotel options. The area has nearly 2 million residents and is one of the top 10 fastest growing economies in the nation. This growth drives demand for high-speed, cost-effective data services. Sparkplug is ideally suited to deliver new and competitive communications solutions to this ever-expanding market.
Sparkplug was formed in July 2006 as a result of the merger of three established companies: Sparkplug in Chicago; Prairie iNet in Des Moines, Iowa; and Telespectra in Phoenix. With operations and networks across eight states, Sparkplug is one of the largest service providers in the fixed wireless business broadband market. Sparkplug’s broadband services support mission-critical, high-bandwidth voice, video and data applications such as hosted VoIP, disaster recovery or redundancy, data and backup storage, virtual private networking (VPN) and other online applications.
This latest transaction is a part of Sparkplug’s growth strategy to expand its service areas into new and existing markets, and follows on the heels of Sparkplug’s recent acquisition of fixed wireless broadband provider, Renaissance Networking Inc. (RNi) in Phoenix.
Compared to traditional wired networks, Sparkplug’s fixed wireless business broadband network offers business customers significant advantages. In addition to high speeds, fast installation and reliable service at lower costs, Sparkplug offers easily-scalable, high-speed, dedicated, symmetrical bandwidth. Customers can cost-effectively scale their bandwidth from 2 Mbps to 1 Gbps in a fraction of the time it would take to provision the bandwidth from a traditional wired provider. In addition to existing telecom services, businesses use Sparkplug wireless broadband to add capacity, redundancy and reliability for services such as broadband access, VoIP, video and other advanced IP services. Large enterprises, cellular carriers and government customers also depend on Sparkplug to provide data transport, backhaul and trunking, and to install and manage their data connections across multiple locations.
Sparkplug investors include Ignition Partners, The Greenspun Corporation, Trilogy Equity Partners, and Allen and Company.
About Sparkplug
Sparkplug is a leading fixed wireless broadband service provider currently operating networks across five states, including the metropolitan markets of Chicago, Nashville, Des Moines, Phoenix and Las Vegas. The company offers a suite of high-speed data, voice over IP, and other managed services over its own network to business, education and government customers. All enjoy the benefits of fast, scalable and easy-to-deploy broadband service. Customers can choose from a complete range of symmetrical bandwidth service options starting at 2 Mbps with speeds up to 1 Gbps at a fraction of the typical cost. The company also provides high capacity data services and transport to many of the nation's leading telecommunications providers. For more information, visit www.sparkplug.net.
Media Inquiries:
Rob Goodman
McKenzie Worldwide
(503) 863-2004
robg@mckenzieworldwide.com
