Internet provider Sonic enters Sacramento market

SR-based company aims for statewide coverage

Wednesday, November 9, 2005

By STEVE HART
THE PRESS DEMOCRAT

Santa Rosa-based Internet provider Sonic.net is expanding to Sacramento, the next phase in its plan to become a statewide carrier.

"Our goal is to build a network covering much of the state with broadband services," said Sonic chief executive Dane Jasper.

In the past 18 months, Sonic has extended its coverage to Southern California and part of the San Joaquin Valley. The 11-year-old company now is the largest independent Internet service provider based in Northern California, with about $12 million in yearly revenues.

The company survived a shakeout in the Internet business because it didn't expand too quickly, Jasper said. "The industry model was 'grow big or go home,'" he said. "That hasn't been our philosophy."

Instead, Sonic competes with the giant telephone and cable Internet companies by offering superior technical support and customer service, according to Jasper.

"That's what we're really good at," he said.

Sonic was the top-rated regional Internet provider in a survey conducted by BroadBandReports.com, a Web site that reviews communications companies.

Sonic has almost 44,000 subscribers from Los Angeles to the Oregon border. About 70 people work in the company's 36,000-square-foot headquarters on Apollo Way in Santa Rosa.

Most of the nation's 16 million DSL users buy their high-speed Internet service directly from SBC and three other regional Bell companies: Verizon, BellSouth and Qwest. But smaller companies such as Sonic provide Internet connections to millions of others.

Sonic, which delivers DSL services over SBC Communications' lines, is SBC's third-largest independent customer.

Jasper said Sonic has ordered new DSL circuits and will be expanding into the Davis-Sacramento-Lake Tahoe area during the first quarter of 2006.

"That's where we received the most requests from existing customers," Jasper said. "We see them moving into that area for school and jobs."

The company now is considering extensions into the Chico, Monterey-Salinas and San Diego areas.

Sonic will be partnering with smaller Internet providers in some of the new territory. The local services will use Sonic's network platform to offer DSL at competitive rates, Jasper said. Sonic is working on partnership deals with about 20 local providers, Jasper said.

Sonic's staff could grow by about 10 percent over the next year.

In addition to DSL and dial-up Internet service, Sonic provides Web site hosting, e-mail, wireless broadband and business connections.

Sonic and other independent DSL providers could be hurt by a Federal Communications Commission ruling in August that said phone companies don't have to lease their high-speed Internet lines to competitors at wholesale rates.

Jasper said the decision won't affect Sonic because it has negotiated a five-year contract with the phone company for DSL access. But smaller providers could lose their access, and they may have to partner with larger independents such as Sonic to offer DSL, he said.

Privately held Sonic traces its roots to an Internet project at Santa Rosa Junior College in 1991. Jasper and Sonic technology chief Scott Doty founded the company in 1994 after collaborating on a college computer network serving students, faculty and staff.

Sonic began with two computers and eight phone lines in the back room of a Santa Rosa house, Jasper said. Jasper and Doty are the majority owners.