This episode of The Broadband Bunch features host Pete Pizzutillo in conversation with Kathy Kirchner, Senior Vice President of Service Assurance at Zayo. Kathy shares her journey from a Sprint call center to leading service assurance for one of North America’s largest fiber networks, with career stops spanning independent telcos, cable operators, Comcast, and startups. Her cross-functional experience in operations, engineering, customer care, logistics, and sales shapes how she approaches service quality and customer experience today.

Kathy dives into the realities of running a large, acquisition-heavy network: data integrity challenges, documentation gaps, fiber cuts, and the quest for faster, cleaner integrations. She explains how Zayo is using automation and AI differently—automating workflows like dispatch and ticketing while leveraging AI for alarm correlation, predictive maintenance, and faster RFO creation. Along the way, she talks about building a “single pane of glass” for operations, preparing for AI data center and long-haul demand, empowering teams with shared accountability, and offers practical advice for women pursuing leadership in technology.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, host Pete Pizzutillo sits down with Chris Sikora, Chief Revenue Officer, and Tony Thakur, Chief Technology Officer at GPC Fiber, to explore their 165-mile, 400G-capable fiber build across Kentucky and what it means for mission-critical connectivity in the region. The conversation traces Chris and Tony’s long careers in fiber, the evolution from Great Plains Communications to the GPC Fiber brand, and why Kentucky’s Louisville–Lexington–Cincinnati–Indianapolis corridor is such a powerful hub for economic growth.

The episode highlights how GPC approaches market selection, their focus on mission-critical connectivity for hospitals, hyperscalers, logistics companies, and small businesses, and how vertical integration—designing, building, and supporting their own network—creates a differentiated customer experience. Tony breaks down the network architecture behind their 400G backbone, the path to 800G and 1.6T, ring topology for resiliency, and how they think about backbone, middle mile, and last mile design to ensure scalability and low latency. Chris shares how transparency, geographic expertise, and frictionless collaboration have helped GPC win business with hyperscalers and support economic development in rural Kentucky—“not just lighting up fiber, but lighting up opportunity.” The episode wraps with a look ahead at how AI, security, and seamless customer experiences will shape GPC Fiber’s next chapter in the Southeast.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, host Pete Pizzutillo sits down with Travis Rice, Senior Director of Sales and Marketing at Camvio, recorded at Calix ConneXions 2025. Travis shares his unexpected path from fintech to telecom, how he landed at Camvio, and the company’s mission to simplify operations for ISPs through its end-to-end OSS/BSS platform.

Pete and Travis dig into some of the biggest challenges and trends shaping today’s broadband landscape: fragmentation across systems, the shift toward best-of-breed architectures, and the evolving role of integrations in delivering seamless subscriber experiences. Travis explains why many operators still struggle with brittle scripts, lack of standards, and aging infrastructures—and why consolidation paired with smart ecosystem partnerships is becoming essential.

They also explore the current state of AI in telecom, why much of the market is still in the “hype cycle,” and how AI will enhance—not replace—the people behind networks. Travis discusses the real opportunities: empowering CSRs, improving ticketing and escalation workflows, and elevating the customer experience.

Finally, Travis offers candid advice for operators navigating digital transformation, system scalability, migrations, and M&A-driven change—reminding leaders that long-term success depends on modern architecture, trusted partners, and a strategy built around data and efficiency, not just new tools.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, sponsored by ETI Software and VETRO FiberMap, Pete Pizzutillo catches up with Chris McKenzie, VP of Network Operations at Rapid Fiber, while at Calix ConneXions 2025. Chris shares his unconventional journey from the music industry to corporate IT to rural broadband, and how that experience shaped Rapid Fiber’s fast-moving deployment strategy. In just two years, the team has grown from zero to 7,000 subscribers while building out their entire network—staying a full quarter ahead of schedule. He explains why they rejected traditional demand aggregation and instead marketed fiber availability feeder-by-feeder, dramatically improving customer satisfaction and community engagement.

Chris also breaks down how AI is quickly becoming essential for small, efficient broadband teams. Rapid Fiber is using automation to reduce truck rolls, stay ahead of network issues, and keep subscriber experiences strong. He also highlights the value of Calix ConneXions, where operators gain direct access to industry leaders and emerging technologies. Tune in to learn how Rapid Fiber is scaling rural broadband with precision, creativity, and AI-driven operations.

This episode of The Broadband Bunch features a conversation between host Pete Pizzutillo and Scott Neuman, Corporate Vice President of Marketing at Calix, recorded at Calix Connections 2025 in Las Vegas.

Scott shares how Calix is redefining the broadband industry’s approach to AI, customer education, and ecosystem collaboration. He explains how Calix helps service providers move beyond AI “literacy” toward true AI fluency, enabling them to understand, trust, and strategically deploy AI to transform their operations. The discussion covers the importance of building a solid data foundation, the rise of agent-based architectures, and how Calix’s “layer cake” approach ensures that AI initiatives deliver measurable value rather than short-lived hype.

Pete and Scott also explore how broadband providers can quantify business impact—from churn reduction and customer success strategies to driving adoption through data insights. Newman offers an inside look at Calix’s Connections On Demand virtual follow-up event, new innovations in SmartLife services, and how AI is enabling a new era of hyper-personalized marketing and customer engagement.

The episode closes with a forward-looking discussion on BEAD funding, industry consolidation, and what it really takes for ISPs to thrive in an AI-driven broadband economy.

This episode of The Broadband Bunch was recorded live at Calix ConneXions 2025, where host Pete Pizzutillo sat down with Bob Carrick, Director of Global Strategy at Calix Cloud.

In this conversation, Bob walks through Calix’s cloud evolution—from its early managed Wi-Fi roots to today’s full-scale broadband platform that integrates Operations, Service, and Engagement Clouds. He shares how Calix’s latest innovations in AI and cloud migration to Google are redefining customer experience, network efficiency, and operational visibility for broadband providers.

Together, Pete and Bob unpack the challenges and opportunities of adopting AI in telecom—from eliminating data silos to building trust through human-in-the-loop models and agent-to-agent automation. They explore the role of industry standards (like TR-369 and MCP) in enabling interoperability, and how these frameworks will shape the next wave of AI-driven transformation across the broadband ecosystem.

Bob also discusses customer success stories, the importance of education and adoption, and how Calix is helping ISPs increase profitability, reduce truck rolls, and prepare for future M&A opportunities.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, host Pete Pizzutillo sits down with Jeff Wabik of DC BLOX for a tour of how modern data centers are conceived, powered, cooled, and connected—especially across the underserved Southeast. Jeff traces his tinkerer roots (think Heathkit computers at age 12) through launching one of the earliest ISPs in the late ’80s, to helping build DC BLOX’s “bunker-plus-connectivity” model and its evolution from regional edge facilities to hyperscale projects—including a Myrtle Beach cable landing station serving global web giants.

Jeff discusses what it takes—from site selection and power realities to five-nines reliability and Tier III design—to deliver on the simple promise of “doing what you said you would do.” He talks through today’s biggest constraints—grid capacity, generator and fiber lead times, and skilled labor gaps—and where innovation fits, from AI-assisted construction verification to smarter alarm reduction across tens of thousands of sensors. Along the way, he offers candid career advice (keep reinventing yourself—and don’t forget sunscreen) and a pragmatic view on on-site generation (natural gas today, nuclear tomorrow?) to meet AI-era demand.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, host Pete Pizzutillo sits down with Felix Virto, Director of Operations at Blue Streak, and Stephen Rose, CEO of Render Networks, to explore how funding realities, digital transformation, and AI are reshaping large-scale fiber builds. Felix shares his 29-year journey from climbing poles in southwest Virginia to leading complex deployments—and why Blue Streak’s recent acquisition by a global parent sharpened its focus on customer outcomes, transparency, and choosing the right partners. Stephen traces a path from construction drafting through Nokia/Bell Labs and IBM to Render, explaining how cloud, data, and AI-driven workflows are changing “pre-live” delivery.

Together, they unpack the industry’s scale problem—billions in construction spend, countless handoffs—and make the case for field-first tools, real-time visibility, and stronger collaboration across operators, designers, and builders. Their playbook for operators: sponsor change from the top, start with a focused use case, co-innovate with partners, and make the field the hero so quality data flows up and better decisions flow down.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, host Pete Pizzutillo sits down with Lee Comer Jr., CEO of Go-Broadband, and Jeremiah Sloan of VETRO FiberMap to explore disaster recovery in the broadband industry. With extreme weather events increasingly impacting infrastructure, the conversation centers around real-world recovery efforts, the chaos of day-one response, and the emotional and operational challenges providers face when networks go down.

Lee and Jeremiah share guidance on how operators can prepare before disaster strikes—emphasizing the importance of having a single source of truth, building network path diversity, and developing a proactive, well-communicated recovery plan. They also discuss how disaster planning intersects with daily operations, how to make the business case for resiliency, and why a structured approach to restoration can mean the difference between days or weeks of downtime.

In this episode of The Broadband Bunch, host Brad Hine is joined by Jeff Boozer, VP of Broadband Strategy at ETI Software, and Don Eben, CEO of CORE Consults, for a conversation on what it really takes for broadband providers to succeed with artificial intelligence. While AI is being hailed as the future of telecom operations, the trio cuts through the buzz to explore the foundational elements that make AI effective—namely, high-quality data, robust integration, and a strategic focus on interoperability.

Drawing on their experience across the broadband ecosystem, Jeff and Don explain why many providers are struggling to implement AI in a meaningful way. The discussion covers how to break down legacy data silos, the importance of defining a “gold” data standard, and how to move from isolated tools to an enterprise-level data and integration strategy. They emphasize that AI should not be viewed as a human replacement but rather as an enabler for faster, smarter decision-making—from customer service to network maintenance to executive dashboards.

The conversation also explores the growing preference for best-in-class systems over end-to-end platforms and how this shift is driving the need for interoperability across OSS, BSS, GIS, and beyond. As Brad notes, AI success doesn’t begin with the model—it begins with the data architecture and the ability to integrate that data cleanly and contextually.