March 22, 2006

New AFN head sees better days

Opportunities for profit plentiful as open carrier

By Vickie Aldous
Ashland Daily Tidings

Franell

The Ashland Fiber Network’s new leader sees promise in a new AFN operations model that would allow businesses to pay the City of Ashland to offer telecommunications services over AFN’s infrastructure.

The Ashland City Council directed staff to pursue such an “open carrier” model earlier this month. Joe Franell, 44, started work from Florida as Ashland’s new Information Technology Director on March 13.

He will begin work on site on April 3 according to Ashland Human Resources Director Tina Gray.

Franell said he has worked for almost nine years for Knology, a southeast-based broadband telecommunications carrier offering telephone, cable television and Internet services. He was the senior manager for operations for Knology’s Pinellas County, Florida property, which is 26 times larger than the AFN network.

Franell’s experience in telephone service likely will prove useful as he considers how to lure companies that might want to offer new services over AFN’s fiber lines. AFN currently offers only television and Internet service.

“I’ve got the contacts in the industry to get that going. There is an untapped revenue source,” Franell said by phone from his Florida home during a break from packing. “I’ve already been approached by companies interested in providing voice-over-Internet in Ashland. The infrastructure and technology is there.”

He noted that AFN operates partially like an open carrier now. Businesses and at least one nonprofit, including Project A and the Jefferson Public Radio Foundation, retail AFN’s wholesale Internet service to customers.

Customers buy cable television service directly from AFN, but city councilors want the city to get out of the money-losing cable television service almost completely. The city would instead provide good reception of local channels and free or low-cost channels to everyone, and stop offering full cable television packages.

Charter Communications Southern Oregon General Manager Mike O’Herron said he doesn’t know whether companies will be interested in providing services over AFN’s infrastructure. While the fiber lines are in place, providing various telecommunications products also requires capital investment in other needed equipment, he said.

“It takes millions of dollars of equipment to use the network,” O’Herron said.

Franell said the open carrier model for for-profit cable television might not work well because of slim profit margins in the television industry. But AFN’s infrastructure could be opened up for community television programming, he said.

“For example, there could be partnering with a college training program where students could be running news shows,” he said.

The open carrier model works better for local and long distance phone service via Internet because of better profit margins, according to Franell.

On the personal side, Franell is married with a 12 year-old daughter. His wife is staying behind in Tampa Bay for a few months to sell their home, which will also allow his daughter time to finish the school year, he said.

Ashland City Attorney Mike Franell is his brother. His parents and another brother live in Albany, and Franell’s wife also has family in Oregon.

“That was one of the driving factors,” he said. “I have been away from family for so long, it was natural to look in the Oregon-Washington area.” Franell — who has an easy laugh, an outgoing personality and an ability to translate high-tech jargon into everyday language — said he is looking forward to getting to know members of the community and wants to have an open relationship with the public.

“In a vacuum or absence of information, people assume the worst. My intention is to be very, very open and communicate in ways people can understand,” he said.

Franell invited people to e-mail him at franellj@ashlandfiber.net.

City officials had declined to release his resume. Franell said, in this day and age, there are identity theft issues with releasing resumes. But he has written a letter to introduce himself to the public. That letter is publicly available and also can be accessed on the Ashland Daily Tidings Web site at www.dailytidings.com.

Staff writer Vickie Aldous can be reached at 479-8199 or vlaldous@yahoo.com.