Broadband Insights Helps ISPs Build Smarter Networks with Custom Analytics Platform

Introduction

Broadband Insights, a subsidiary of Staged Systems, LLC, has built an analytics platform to serve internet service providers (ISPs), fiber and wireless builders, and telecom industry advocates. The platform focuses on broadband deployments which span planning, construction, operations, and billing. Services offered via the platform to startup ISP companies include gathering and aggregating data, ensuring data integrity, and building reports and dashboards.

Challenge

One of the most significant challenges in expanding broadband access in the United States lies in serving rural and underserved communities. High-speed internet providers often find it financially impractical to invest in rural areas, where constructing expensive fiber networks or upgrading existing infrastructure is unlikely to yield sufficient profit. Many large ISPs focus on wealthier neighborhoods where they can charge more for premium services like fiber. This practice leaves low-income and rural communities without adequate service, creating a persistent digital divide.

In the absence of substantial federal funding or incentives, rural residents often resort to building makeshift solutions. Individuals and small, local groups in these areas set up their own towers and antennas, purchasing the most affordable equipment they can find. While these efforts allow some communities to achieve minimal connectivity, they often lack the reliability, speed, and scalability of fiber networks. Additionally, the makeshift setups lack sophisticated network management tools, resulting in limited visibility and control over performance and capacity.

Federal initiatives like the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) program aim to close these gaps by providing billions of dollars for broadband expansion. However, even with these funds, smaller, emerging ISPs still face challenges. They often lack the experience and tools to manage complex network builds effectively. Data analytics, by providing insights into network gaps and costs, can support these smaller ISPs in assessing the viability and impact of their builds, helping them bridge the divide with sustainable infrastructure.

The telecom industry has a fragmented ecosystem of software tools, each handling specific needs: for instance, solutions like 3-GIS, Vetro Fibermap, and IQGeo are prominent for asset management, while others like Vitruvi and Render specialize in fiber-specific construction management.

To unify these disparate data sources, developers typically rely on APIs or even direct data scraping, which requires deep knowledge of the ecosystem. For an analytics platform to provide actionable insights, the challenge is in aggregating data from multiple sources and presenting it in dashboards or data apps.

Another complexity comes from balancing flexibility with accuracy, especially given the wide range of data formats used across different broadband tools. Some companies still rely on basic spreadsheet tools for tracking, while others use specialized Geographic Information Systems (GIS), CRM, and subscriber management systems.

An effective analytics platform must accommodate all these formats, creating a unified experience that meets clients “where they are.” It requires a broad technical approach that can accommodate everything from fiber management to CRM data, often requiring custom APIs or partnerships to maintain reliability and precision across all components.

Solution

Broadband Insights offers a custom-built analytics platform, scaled on Azure, to help startup ISPs manage data and track fiber assets effectively.

The company initially struggled to balance daily data collection from dispersed sources, executive reporting, and user-specific accessibility, exploring Looker Studio and Google Sheets to create quick, shareable updates for stakeholders. However, these tools fell short in customizability, limiting their ability to design dynamic, responsive data applications tailored to investor and construction needs.

After assessing BI tools such as Tableau and Qlik, Broadband Insights found Plotly Dash Enterprise to be the ideal fit, given its Python compatibility and customization options. Dash Enterprise allowed the team to integrate financials, sales metrics, and construction updates into a multi-page, user-friendly data app, accessible via mobile for team members on the go. This setup provided executive stakeholders with quick insights through automated PDF reports powering faster decisions. Data from third-party APIs is pulled into REDIS as a cache and refreshed from PostgreSQL, with celery workers within the Dash app.

Now, Broadband Insights provides a custom platform that enables network engineers, field operators, and sales personnel across departments to access and analyze all relevant data. Using the platform’s multi-page layout, executives, project managers, and investors each have a tailored view, improving efficiency and decision-making at every level.

Results

Broadband Insights enables broadband startups to optimize operations and enhance decision-making. For example, the company has helped ISPs accomplish the following:

• Achieved 2% increase in subscriber penetration by identifying regions with growth opportunity through targeted data analytics
• Reduced operational costs of 5% by consolidating data from multiple systems, cutting the need for duplicate software licenses
• Decreased weekly report generation time by 5 hours, and monthly report generation by over 10 hours, automating data collection and analysis previously done in Excel or Google Sheets.
• Reduced customer installation timelines by 50% by providing clear data on scheduled installs, crew capacity, and throughput
• Streamlined the monthly reporting process, reducing turnaround time from three weeks to about four days by systematically collecting and calculating operating metrics and KPIs

With Dash Enterprise, Broadband Insights consistently drives impactful results for its customers, helping them build smarter networks that provide better connectivity to rural and underserved regions in the United States. Broadband Insights emerges as a vital partner for broadband providers aiming for smarter, faster market expansion.