With new model, Utah takes last shot at Utopia

At the same time, Utopia is vying for greater customer commitments. Where it once charged retailers “almost nothing” for fiber builds, Livingston said, “They’ve since changed that to say, ‘We’ll make you go through a traditional cost justification,’ which is what a normal telco might do, but they’re willing to amortize that into a contract period of a couple years. So if you’re willing to sign up for a service commitment of around two years, there is no buildout cost, and that still makes sense for a majority of folks when you can’t get anything else – DSL or cable.”

Utopia is also considering wholesaling video services to its customers (though today only MStar offers video on the network). Utopia has had an agreement with iProvo (now Broadweave) to share a video head end. But that contract expires next month, and since Provo’s network has changed owners, Utopia and Broadweave have been in talks lately to resolve who owns what in that facility, according to the Utah Daily Herald.

But Utopia’s reformation will be an uphill battle, as the project’s missteps thus far have tarnished its name, and its political troubles may make potential customers nervous about how long it will be around.

Meanwhile, the incumbent in Utah, Qwest Communications, is now aggressively rolling out fiber to the node, with 7-Mb/s and 20-Mb/s services – something it wasn’t doing when the initial case for Utopia was being made.

“The moment these guys go into an area in any kind of substantial way, Qwest is right behind them,” Livingston said.

Utopia’s new managers are of course well aware of these challenges and on their slim margin for error at this point.