At the end of July 2024, the fiber broadband industry will gather in the city of Nashville, Tennessee for FiberConnect 2024. With the industry getting excited about what could be the biggest fiber broadband expansion period in the industry thanks to BEAD funding, I have been reflecting on one of Nex-Tech’s most impactful fiber deployment projects – the deployment of fiber to McCarty Family Farms, in Rexford, Kansas.

For many years, we have been deploying broadband across rural Kansas, thereby sustaining many businesses, and McCarty Family Farms is one of the finest examples of our effort. A few weeks ago, I visited the farm to learn about the innovative ways they are leveraging fiber. I discovered 5 facts which are listed below.

1. The availability of Nex-Tech fiber broadband was one of the main reasons why the McCarty family chose Rexford. The site of the farm was chosen because of the availability to get fiber optic Internet. Today, our fiber sustains all the high-tech operations of the farm.

2. Nex-Tech fiber enables the use of electronic sensors to track many aspects of the welfare of over 32,000 cows. It also allows for the optimization of the rearing process with instantaneous insights.

3. Nex-Tech fiber controls the temperature monitoring and adjustment systems within the milking carousel, ensuring that the cows stay cool throughout the milking process. As I was told, “If the internet goes down, the farm is in trouble.” Fiber enables the milking carousels to run 24 hours a day, milking a staggering 10,000 cows a day!

4. Nex-Tech fiber enables the automation of many aspects of the milk processing procedure, including the condensing plant which is the only one of its kind in the United States. The farm also supplies dairy to a multinational yogurt company, Dannon. They are able to do that because they meet the stringent 24/7 monitoring requirements thanks to Nex-Tech fiber connection.

5. Nex-Tech fiber broadband connects the McCarty Family Farm to the rest of the world in a variety of ways. On the premises, new partnerships to create more value from the cows by generating methane gas are underway and Nex-Tech is proud to be part of this process.

Nex-Tech is still building and expanding our fiber service. Check out what we are up to here.
I am grateful to the Communications Coordinator of the farm, Shelly Macumber for taking me around and explaining the many operations of the farm.