What Vital Role will MDUs Play in Your Broadband Plan?

MDUs - Multi Dwelling Units. Apartments, office buildings, incubators and the like. They don’t attract much attention in mainstream media coverage of broadband, but advocates for these networks are taking a greater interest in MDUs.

In Kansas City, geeks and budding software developers are flocking to apartments with gigabit access. Red Wing, MN has made a commercial MDU the centerpiece of its broadband adoption strategy. In a stroke economic development genius, Santa Monica, CA convinced commercial building owners to extend the city’s fiber network inside their buildings, and eliminated tenant vacancies.

Bryan Rader, CEO of Bandwidth Consulting, explains to listeners how and why broadband planners need to factor MDUs into their strategy. Issues discussed are:

• MDUs’ role as anchor tenants on the network    
• the economic development impact of broadband integration with MDUs
• one-size adoption strategies don’t fit all MDUs
• partnering commercial building owners with other broadband stakeholders