Teltlk: Starting Up Communication Structure From Scratch

Humble Beginnings

Teltlk was established as a small telecom company in the year 2000 with the sole vision of offering phone and internet connectivity within the rural areas of the nation. Teltlk was started by Alex Gomez and Eva Chen best friends since childhood, Teltl began with only twelve employees and a rented office space.

Indeed, starting their business with a small office, Alex and Eva planned to become an important telecommunication company that will be able to offer a fast and reliable connection even in the most remote regions of the country. This they felt that was very important since they thought that everyone had the right to access some form of communication services.

Bootstrapping the Business

During the early stages of Teltlk, the organization faced serious constraints in terms of funding hence they were forced to self-fund their business activities.

Some of the ways Teltlk conserved costs included:-

Leasing simple commercial premises excluding CBDs with a view of keeping costs of rent as low as possible
It is best when the team is small, but highly motivated and has enough people ready to do anything.
Working with local stakeholders and small businesses and gradually building up their network of shops and offices.
Purchasing second hand switch or routers and renovating them on their own.

However, the financial constraints were still evident at the Teltlk team, but they were determined to establish connectivity in the rural regions of the country.

First Network Rollouts

Finally in 2005 Teltlk was prepared for the first network rollout, which aimed to spread out its services among rural towns with population under 5000 residents, which took 3 years to prepare.

Community-First Approach

Teltlk took a community-first approach when building out its rural infrastructure:-

They conducted focus group meetings and learned from each town what was important in terms of needs and wants. Speed? Reliability? Affordable rates?
They employed local people of the community to be trained as the personnel for installing and also maintaining the equipments. This built trust and local buy-in for the planned projects.
To launch in each of these locations, they sought out key businesses, schools, and hospitals as initial clients. These key institutions created demand among customers.

Teltlk made sure that having the needs and values of each community that it wants to serve dictate the kind of infrastructure it lays down and thus created steady user base right from the beginning.

Optimized Wireless Network

Teltlk: To determine the most cost-effective technologies for rural networks.

Marked out the geography and topographical features of target areas
Used simulations to define the best placement of the wired access points as well as wireless towers
Operated in compliance with LOS and NO-LOS constraints of wireless
Implemented the solar and satellite solutions to the farthest regions

After the dedicated effort and the numerous experiments, Teltlk managed to create ideal wireless networks that operated effectively, including the facilities of the harsh rural landscapes. It was done in such a way that the networks that were developed were in line with the expectations of each region.

Teltlk A Decade of Growth

In the next decade the company known as Teltlk went through steady growth as it continued to grow more of its rural network coverage.

Winning Government Grants

Early on, Teltlk realized that government grants would be key to subsidizing its high upfront infrastructure costs:Early on, Teltlk realized that government grants would be key to subsidizing its high upfront infrastructure costs:

Teltlk also looked into the federally and state-funded programs that offered connectivity grants
They developed effective grant applications that emphasized the links and potential economic impact.
For the years, Teltlk received millions of dollars in government funding and which enabled the company to scale up.

Another strategic priority for Teltlk was the use of additional government subsidies throughout the financing along with the owners’ own private funding.

Hiring a Growing Team

As Teltlk expanded into more rural regions, they had to rapidly scale up their team:

While starting the business with only 12 members, the number of employees reached more than half a thousand in 8 years.
They developed new regional offices equipped with dedicated rural outreach teams.
To ensure that new employees were able to be trained for their respective positions, a world-class training program was started to ensure that the right skills were imparted to the new employees.

Teltlk had devised very effective policy for recruitment, training and skill enhancement to create a pool of workforce for the company to support its vision.

Bringing High-Speed Fiber Everywhere

More ambitious goals were set in 2015: Teltlk had the vision to make fiber internet from the future in the entire country.

Ambitious Fiber Grid

Teltlk knew that fiber-optic internet provided faster speeds and higher data capacity necessary for the future:

They envisioned a large-scale undertaking that consisted of laying nearly 250,000 miles of fiber optic cables
Those plans entailed an establishment of an ambitious fiber grid that can connect the cities and rural towns.
Undersea cables and connections to other networks further helped expand the global network.

This was a very large scale activity that needed lot of coordination but laid the foundation tonext several decades of communication development.

Leveraging Partnerships

Teltlk also knew that fiber expansion on this scale would require help:

Integrated with several telecom hardware partners for much lower cost
This targeted at local utility and infrastructure companies who have remained vital for gaining access to public rights-of-ways.
People broadband stimulus packages introduced billions toward the project

It was thus possible for Teltlk to embark on great fiber projects way beyond its own capability through formation of win-win partnerships.

The Future Is Bright

Since it started in a single rented office more than twenty years ago, Teltlk has become the leading rural broadband internet service provider in the nation, as well as gradually deploying high-fiber internet connection all over the country.

While Alex and Eva sit and consider the impact that Teltlk has been making in delivering communication capabilities to various parts of the world, they both feel proud of the company’s success. They realize there are many more blocks yet to be laid but the one-time tiny venture is now serving millions of people and businesses with the hope of a better tomorrow.