‘We want what's best for rural Manitoba'

Winnipeg Free Press

a day ago

WINKLER — By the time he was a teenager, Hank Wall had built his own computer using components he found at a thrift store. When he was in high school and there weren't enough teachers available, he taught computer classes to his peers.
At the age of 16, he started a computer repair and IT business called Constellation Computers he ran for more than a decade.
'I love technology,' says Wall, 40. 'I love knowledge (and) I love learning.'
But when he was running Constellation Computers, Wall continually ran into a problem that impacted not just his business but rural Manitobans everywhere.
'We had crappy internet,' Wall says, remembering how slow and insufficient the service was. 'It didn't need to be. The technology existed (to make it better).'
Today, Wall is the chief technology officer at Valley Fiber Ltd., a company he co-founded in 2016 with Mike Wolf, chief financial officer, and Conley Kehler, executive director of strategic partnerships.
Headquartered 115 kilometres southwest of Winnipeg in Winkler, the telecommunications infrastructure company specializes in the development, construction and operations of fibre and fixed-wireless infrastructure for residential and commercial use.
Valley Fiber has a special interest in reaching communities that were previously under-served, Kehler says.
'We want what's best for rural Manitoba,' he says. 'We didn't want to give rural Manitoba what everybody else had. We wanted to give rural Manitoba (something) better than everybody else.'
Valley Fiber is building a cutting-edge fibre optic network. The company's competitors, Kehler says, will send a single strand of fibre into a neighbourhood that is potentially split between 32, 64 or even 128 customers, impacting the speed at which their internet runs.
Valley Fiber, on the other hand, runs a single strand to each of its customers. Kehler compares it to the telephone system going from party lines to individual lines.
'No one is on a shared network,' he says. 'No one.'
One of the company's earliest projects was with the City of Winkler.
In 2017, the city paid Valley Fiber $500,000 to hook up every civic building and donated about 1.5 acres to build the company a headquarters and data centre. In return, Valley Fiber provided free installation for every house and building in Winkler not owned by the city.
It took the average internet speed from five megabits per second to 1,000. Bandwidth has only expanded from there.
'It will be like going from working the field with a horse and wagon to working the field with a new John Deere tractor,' Martin Harder, then-mayor of Winkler, told the Free Press in March 2017 after the city made the agreement.
In 2020, Valley Fiber attracted a majority investment from Dutch-based private equity firm, DIF Capital Partners, allowing for significant growth.
Today, Valley Fiber's network stretches as far north as Gypsumville, as far east as Sprague, as far south as Emerson and as far west as Ninette.
The company delivers dedicated connectivity for homes and businesses — including internet, TV and phone options — to 40,000 customers in more than 200 communities. In 2023, PC Magazine named Valley Fiber the fastest internet service provider in the province.
The company started with 10 staff members and now employs around 350.
That includes 100 people who work at Valley Fiber's call centre, located a five-minute drive from the company's headquarters. If customers have a problem, their call is answered by someone in Manitoba, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, year-round.
Mike Breiter, director of IT for the City of Morden, can attest to the difference using Valley Fiber's services makes.
In 2019, the city issued a request for proposal seeking an internet provider to bring high-speed internet to the region. Valley Fiber was among the applicants and after being chosen, the company got to work.
The company invested $10 million for dedicated fibre lines in Morden, and the city invested $850,000 for its own network.
Breiter says prior to Valley Fiber, he felt like he was living in the 1990s when it came to using the internet. He had a DSL connection that, if he was lucky, provided him four megabits of bandwidth. He could barely stream anything, much less use any type of video communications.
He laughs when asked what difference being on Valley Fiber's network has made for individual customers and the city as a whole.
'It's really opened a lot of doors for Morden, in terms of businesses,' Breiter says. 'Internet and IT structure has become a more critical component of a lot of businesses these days. Now we have the infrastructure to support those businesses when and where needed.'
Whether they're connecting with friends or streaming a television series, having high-speed internet has also given residents a better user experience when they're online, Breiter adds.
Breiter calls Morden's partnership with Valley Fiber 'one of the best decisions we have ever made' and describes the company's IT professionals as some of the most talented he has met during his 25 years in the industry.
'I was initially worried about whether they could deliver on some of their promises and they have always delivered above and beyond every contractual agreement we had,' Breiter says.
For Wall and Kehler, Valley Fiber's partnership with Morden is an example of why the company exists.
'I'm a very firm believer that we're all here to make the world a better place — otherwise, what's the point, right?' Wall says. 'My way of making the world better is by offering better connectivity … This is my way of helping my neighbours.'
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Kehler believes Valley Fiber has made the keystone province a better place to live.
'We have changed how people live and can live and do live, and we've done it with technology that has been harnessed in Manitoba,' he says. 'We've done it with Manitoba people and we've done it for Manitoba.'
The company is looking forward to serving more customers in the years to come, Kehler adds.
'Our technology continues to change, our product continues to change (and) our growth continues,' he says. 'We're going to expand well past the points that we're at now.'
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Aaron EppReporter
Aaron Epp reports on business for the Free Press. After freelancing for the paper for a decade, he joined the staff full-time in 2024. He was previously the associate editor at Canadian Mennonite. Read more about Aaron.
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