Mayor Spins as Rumors Fly: Just What is Going on With iProvo?

The Deseret News recently ran an article on iProvo in which Mayor Billings claimed that iProvo is seeing a major turnaround under Broadweave’s direction. Certainly there are areas that have been improved drastically, live support being the most notable. Unfortunately, this improvement in response time has been at the cost of frequent outages with the TV programming guide, a 3-4 hour outage this morning for all Internet users and a lack of general notification as to what the heck exactly is going on.

Mstar is reportedly still receiving payments for customers they sold to Broadweave. Bills have arrived from Broadweave without explanation as to who this bill was from and their purchase of the network. Rates were scheduled to increase, but not notification was sent as to how existing plans will be migrated. This is top-notch management? There’s just two weeks for Sorenson to complete their review of the financing without so much as a peep as to how that’s going.

Amidst all this are many disturbing rumors floating around. CEO Steve Christensen is reportedly having to pay employee salaries out his own pocket. It’s also alleged that Broadweave is using trucks with city plates to do business in Provo. We’ve also witnessed the departure of all iProvo NOC techs and a significant amount of the rest of the staff, a major loss of expertise that cannot be easily compensated for. With the lack of basic notifications and the “silent running” attitude, it’s no wonder that rumors like this continue to persist.

Sounds like Broadweave needs to reconsider who’s doing their PR. Anyone out there willing to fill in the gaps?

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10 Responses to Mayor Spins as Rumors Fly: Just What is Going on With iProvo?

  1. Harold Bills says:

    Believe me Sorenson is long gone. Other potential finance providers are being courted. There was a network-wide outage yesterday that affected customers all over the city, City remote locations, and City internet services for internal operations. The outage averaged 3-4 hours, but many customers were down all day. The word is that a former Provo employee, now employed by Spanish Fork was the catalyst for the outage.
    I think the Mayor is trying to help Broadweave get their financing with his less than truthful press release. He cannot be naive enough to really believe any of that.

  2. iStillLikeiProvo? says:

    I keep reading about what is going on with Broadweave and former Mstar customers, but what about former (current?) Nuvont customers on iProvo, such as myself?

    Nuvont customers haven’t received a single communication from Broadweave or Nuvont about what is happening. I have called and emailed them to try to find out what is going on. Nuvont’s phones don’t work, so they can’t be reached by phone. Broadweave tells me that I’m a Nuvont customer, and that I might remain a Nuvont customer. Some segments of iProvo will remain with Nuvont, I’m told. I don’t remember seeing anything like that in the terms of the agreement. What’s going on?

    Staying with Nuvont is probably a good thing. Their rates are certainly better than Broadweave’s. During the hearings Nuvont stated that they are in the black, so maybe their nice rates are even sustainable.

  3. Jesse says:

    I’m hopefully that Nuvont will come out of the woodwork soon and clear the air. That their support lines are still down is downright scary and reason enough to look for another service provider.

  4. iStillLikeiProvo? says:

    Nuvont’s support lines have never, ever worked if called from a Nuvont powered home phone. That hasn’t stopped them from providing great Internet access, and decent phone service (as long as you don’t have to call Nuvont).

  5. MoleMan says:

    Six Phases of a Project

    1. Enthusiasm
    -Everyone was very excited for the project from the beginning. Many uncomfortable details, laws, policies, and regulations were ignored internally and externally to assure the project’s success.

    2. Disillusionment
    -Once Atlantic Engineering Group got the contract and started building the network out, disaster was on the horizon. The damaged fiber, that caused massive outages for over 500 customers, in north Provo was turned into the construction group as being too low right after if was hung in 2003.

    3. Panic
    -This is the best kept secret in Provo. The mayor and iProvo management have been panicked in secret about this whole thing for years now; all along telling us how awesome and wonderful thing are. Nothing to see here citizen.

    4. Search for the Guilty
    – Let’s blame the service providers everything. Service providers especially Nuvont/Veracity used Provo’s weak contracts or non-existant contracts to their full advantage. After all, are Nuvont, Mstar, and Veracity not in the business of making money? All they are doing is full business advantage of a weak contracts which Provo itself wrote.

    5. Punishment of the Innocent
    – Provo management (all the way to the top) are the guilty ones here for the failure of the entire project. However, I do not see any blame headed their way. All we see is the punishment of the innocent. Employees who have worked really hard and put in many long hours, have lost jobs, have had their professional reputations tarnished by this whole mess, and all for what? This?

    6. Praise and Honors for the Non-Participants
    – Whomever you see getting public praise for this whole disaster belongs in this category. I’m sure that Utopia will now step in and save the day. Trust me it’s already happening.

  6. Jesse says:

    MoleMan: The more I look at iProvo, the more it becomes crystal clear that it was killed by poor management in spite of the best efforts of the rank-and-file. I particularly blame Kevin Garlick and Mayor Billings for failing to hire a telcom manager despite the many qualified individuals who applied for the position.

  7. Deep Throat says:

    I don’t know if a new telcom manager would have made a difference. The original telecom manager was not allowed to make many decisions so a new manager might have also been a puppet without the power to make the needed changes. Without the power to hire and fire, make policy decisions and set direction for the enterprise (all powers held by Mr. Garlic or the Mayor) the manager is not a manager in more than name.

  8. Harold Bills says:

    Deep Throat,

    You are right on. Mr Garlic has always been the true dictator of anything iProvo. He has decided everything. The Mayor, council, and other administration officials are mere pawns in his game. The mayor especially should be embarrassed at allowing himself to be led down this road to disaster.If you want to fix iProvo, start with removing Mr. Garlic from city employment.

  9. Capt. Video says:

    The sale agreement give Broadweave a sweet “right of first refusal” on all voice, video and data services Provo City buys.

    When any contract come up for renewal or any new proposal Provo City receives, they must provide a copy of the contract to Broadweave. (So much for business confidential information or pricing)

    Broadweave then can provide that service to Provo at that price and under those conditions.

    How would other businesses LOVE to be in that position? You get to see the other guys offer and then decide if you want the contract or not under those terms.

  10. Harold Bills says:

    This would be easily challenged legally. It’s moronic to have even considered it.
    Just another reason Billings and Garlic need to go.

    I am wondering if the Friday closing #2 took place or not. What no press release?

    I heard there were some last minute problems, but nothing more.

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