Mike Parker, Head of Innovation and R&D at Aqualinq, discusses how Aqualinq is transforming fiber deployment by using water pipes as secure, pre-existing conduits for fiber cables. This groundbreaking method leverages the water flow to deploy fiber at record-breaking speeds, averaging about a mile per day.
Aqualinq's trenchless technology reduces permitting challenges—typically cutting deployment time by 85% and realizing an average cost saving of 30% compared to traditional methods.
The company recently received awards from Fierce Networks for addressing the digital divide and advancing next-gen deployments. Notably, Aqualinq’s successful project in Anacortes, Washington, showcased its ability to traverse difficult terrains and river crossings seamlessly.
For water utilities, the technology offers ongoing benefits, including leak detection, pipe condition monitoring, and improved operational efficiency. By significantly reducing time to market and enhancing project viability, Aqualinq gives bidders a competitive edge in BEAD funding applications.
Learn more at Aqualinq’s website.
Mike Parker:
Hello, everybody. My name's Mike Parker. I'm head of innovation and R&D for Aqualinq. Aqualinq is a revolutionary and cutting-edge fiber deployment technique. We've developed a method of deploying fiber cables through water pipes, using the water pipes as a pre-existing conduit. Water pipes provide a very secure, highly protected containment that's also quite deeply located. So it's a very, very secure mechanism for deploying the fiber to, and we can use the flow of the water itself to deploy the fiber within the pipe so we can deploy it very rapidly. So we're typically talking about maybe a mile a day, which is fairly record-breaking, I think most people would agree.
Now, because it's primarily trenchless, then the permitting and the wayleaves that you would need for any form of normal civil fiber deployment technique are largely mitigated, and of course, all the upfront time delays that are associated with gaining these. So there's a big cost and time saving actually upfront with our system. Putting it very simply, Aqualinq is faster, cheaper, and more secure than traditional fiber deployments. So on average, we say it's about 85% faster. That's 85%, it's remarkable, and about 30% cheaper than traditional deployment techniques. What this means is time to market is much, much quicker. By using our method and water pipes, we can get fiber to areas more economically than could be achieved, and where economically, in fact, they may not be previously viable at all.
We've completed multiple projects over here in the USA. They've all been very successful. And actually, the purpose of this interview itself is that we've recently won two quite coveted awards from yourselves, from Fierce Networks, for addressing the digital divide and also next-generation deployments, which we're of course very proud of. Fair while back, we completed a project in the city of Anacortes, which is in Washington state. That project got rave reviews all round from the ISP, the mayor, the water utility. Everyone was just blown away. Even the state governor actually came to spend a few days to look at the system when he heard what we'd done.
The city wanted to install fiber. They realized they'd have to get across a lot of very difficult terrain types, a lot of very difficult ground conditions. This included a stretch of about a quarter mile that they had to go actually across a major river. We went in, we looked at it, we discussed the fact they had no economically viable options. Using our techniques, we deployed 20-plus miles of fiber through a pipe that went from their water treatment works right up to the city, across all of these obstacles, linked up on the eastern side to Interstate 5 to the internet points of presence, and the job was done.
BEADs about addressing the digital divide in locations that are currently not economically viable to deploy fiber, and also locations where it is actually difficult to deploy the fiber for a whole number of reasons we've just covered. The award of funding to bidders is essentially on a best bang for the buck, put very, very simply, the maximum delivery in the best time period for a given amount of funding. So any bidder for a given project that is looking to Aqualinq actually as the deployment technique is giving themselves a very, very strong advantage with their bid in the overall cost reduction, the more rapid deployment rates, significantly improved time to market, payback period reduction, and the IRR. So their bid is going to really stand out among all of the other bids, and we believe that that will be of significant benefit to them within their BEAD application.
So, from a high-level view, actually, it's pretty simple. We access the water pipe through the chambers that are regularly placed in a water network. We attach fittings to the water pipes, which are regularly used by water companies, they're called pipe saddles, and we deploy our special purpose fittings into these pipe saddles. These special purpose fittings provide pressure containment and a secure passage for our fiber optic cable or conduit through them.
Well, first off, it's an incremental revenue stream, and it's an in-perpetuity incremental revenue stream. There are a lot of very useful operational benefits that we can offer to a water utility purely by the deployment of the fiber within their asset. To an example, by hooking up our condition monitoring system, that requires just one single fiber from the bundle that's deployed. We can detect and pinpoint leaks within the pipe anywhere in the pipe, highly accurately at any time. And then of course, as I mentioned earlier on, mapping the pipes, providing video surveillance of the inside of the pipe so that water companies can actually see, what does their pipe work actually look like now, spotting things that need fixing.
These are all part of what we do, actually as part of our install process. So a water company also has access to a very rich set of data, as well as all of these features, which will help them on operational basis to optimize their OpEx and CapEx budgets, their staffing and their deployment for repairs and renewals of pipes.
We obviously welcome anybody watching this who'd like to learn a little bit more about the company. Please come visit our website. Please feel free to contact us. We'll be delighted to speak to you. Thank you very much.