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Frontier Coop Partners on Rural Broadband

Co-op brings high-speed broadband internet options to six communities in Butler County, Nebraska

Fiber optic broadband

Nextlink Internet is working with Frontier Cooperative to bring high-speed broadband internet options to six communities in Butler County, Nebraska, reports The Banner-Press.

Nextlink plans to "beam" the internet signal from equipment placed on top of Frontier Coop grain elevators in David City, Bellwood, Brainard, Bruno, Dwight and Garrison.

"Most of Frontier's elevators have gear on them already. Some could be from a legacy provider not yet offering 100 Mbps (megabits/second) speeds. If we are outfitting a new elevator, we typically locate six to 12 small access points and a 2-foot dish that will act as backhaul," Nextlink's Steve Burks said in an email to the Banner-Press on Monday.

Frontier Coop and Nextlink are joined in the project by Land O'Lakes and Microsoft.

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What is the Digital Divide?

Frontier Cooperative, Lincoln, NE, is a member-owner of Land O'Lakes Cooperative. Today’s Frontier Cooperative was formed as the result of a merger between Frontier and Midwest Cooperative in September 2019, but its roots date back to February 18, 1915. Over the years, the predecessors of both Frontier and Midwest completed many mergers and acquisitions, growing their territories across southern and central Nebraska. The Frontier name came into being in 1990, following the merger of Farmers Cooperative Co. of Brainard with Farmers Union Cooperative of Mead.

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