EPB fiber optics help local businesses grow

Cloud computing company Claris Networks is based in Knoxville but is expanding in Chattanooga because of the city's unique fiber optic network.

"We actually see Chattanooga as our largest growth potential," Claris Network Vice President Dave Sagraves said.

At the beginning of the year, Claris had two employees who worked out of a small, single room in a building on Main Street.

Now the business has eight employees working out of an office at The Freight Depot at 1200 Market Street.

"If Knoxville had what Chattanooga has, we'd be investing all those resources in Knoxville. This is the best market for our business to grow," Sagraves said.

Claris provides local businesses "cloud services," which means they host, manage and maintain computer networks for businesses.

The business relies heavily on speedy Internet access and predicts future growth for the Chattanooga business, Sagraves said.

"We are still on the acquisition trail and we expect that we will have between 50 and 100 percent growth from an employee standpoint," he said.

The high speed Internet has benefited other businesses, such as social media start up LifeKraze and Global Green Lighting.

"We switched over after a lot of spotty hours, days and weeks from our previous supplier," Michelle Warren, with LifeKraze, said. "We have had great consistency through EPB."

Global Green Lighting President Don Lepard said the high-speed fiber optic Internet is essential to his business.

"EPB has been my inspiration from day one," he said.

Global Green Lighting develops low-energy lighting control systems, which use the same technology EPB uses with its Smart Meter technology, Lepard said.

The company recently beat out national competition and won a bid to put the lights up across Chattanooga and is currently in the process of generating a contract for the project with the city.

Global Green Lighting has already replaced about 350 street and post lights on the North Shore's Coolidge Park, Frazier Avenue, and on the Walnut Street Bridge, he also said.

An operator can control the lights — which use smart grid and fiber optic technology — via the Internet from up to 35 miles away.

And the company is expanding it's physical presence by taking over the rest of the building and will be making more hires in the next year.

He hopes to grow to 250 employees before the company finishes the project with the city, and he said he expects he will book jobs with other local municipalities, whose leaders have seen what the company has done with lighting in Chattanooga and want that for their city.