Covad Communications Group was an American provider of

broadband In telecommunications, broadband is wide bandwidth data transmission which transports multiple signals at a wide range of frequencies and Internet traffic types, that enables messages to be sent simultaneously, used in fast internet connections. ...

voice The human voice consists of sound made by a human being using the vocal tract, including talking, singing, laughing, crying, screaming, shouting, humming or yelling. The human voice frequency is specifically a part of human sound producti ...

and data communications. By 2006, the company had 530,000 subscribers, and ranked as the 16th largest

ISP An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise private ...

in the United States. Covad was acquired by U.S. Venture Partners, who in 2010 announced a three-way merger of

MegaPath MegaPath was a business telecommunications company. In 2018, MegaPath was acquired by cloud service provider Fusion Connect for $71.5 million. Founded in 1996, it provides a voice, unified communications, internet access, Managed Security Servic ...

, Covad, and

Speakeasy A speakeasy, also called a blind pig or blind tiger, is an illicit establishment that sells alcoholic beverages, or a retro style bar that replicates aspects of historical speakeasies. Speakeasy bars came into prominence in the United States ...

, creating a single Managed Services Local Exchange Carrier (MSLEC), providing voice and internet services; the new company was named

. In January 2015, telecommunications service provider

Global Capacity Global Capacity is a Waltham, Massachusetts-based provider of telecommunications Connectivity-as-a-Service including Carrier Ethernet, used by companies for Internet access and WAN connectivity. Network services are offered using the company's ...

acquired MegaPath's wholesale and direct access business, which included assets acquired from Covad. The name Covad was derived from acronyms which have varied over time, including ''COmbined Voice And Data'', ''Copper Over Voice And Data'', and in its earliest form, ''COpper Value ADded''.

History

Covad was the first service provider to offer a national DSL broadband service. In addition they offered

Voice over IP Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP), also called IP telephony, is a method and group of technologies for the delivery of voice communications and multimedia sessions over Internet Protocol (IP) networks, such as the Internet. The terms Internet t ...

, T1,

Web hosting A web hosting service is a type of Internet hosting service that hosts websites for clients, i.e. it offers the facilities required for them to create and maintain a site and makes it accessible on the World Wide Web. Companies providing we ...

, managed security, IP and

dial-up Dial-up Internet access is a form of Internet access that uses the facilities of the public switched telephone network (PSTN) to establish a connection to an Internet service provider (ISP) by dialing a telephone number on a conventional telepho ...

, and bundled voice and data services directly through Covad's network and through

Internet Service Provider An Internet service provider (ISP) is an organization that provides services for accessing, using, or participating in the Internet. ISPs can be organized in various forms, such as commercial, community-owned, non-profit, or otherwise priva ...

s, value-added resellers, telecommunications carriers and affinity groups to businesses. Covad

services were available in 44 states, including 235 Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSAs), a services area available to over 50 percent of all businesses. The company was founded in San Jose, CA. By 2008, Covad added the Samsung Acemap DSLAM to their portfolio on top of their pre-existing Nokia D50 DSLAMs, to allow for

ADSL2+ G.992.5 (also referred to as ADSL2+, G.dmt.bis+, and G.adslplus) is an ITU-T standard for asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) broadband Internet access. The standard has a maximum theoretical downstream sync speed of 24 megabits per second ...

technology, which can reach DSL speeds up to 15 Mbit/s. The launch of the AceMAP was primarily instigated to provide combined POTS and ADSL2+ service to Earthlink end users and were deployed in more residential areas instead of concentrating on business-centric markets. Covad was acquired a by private equity firm,

Platinum Equity Platinum Equity, LLC is an American private equity investment firm founded by Tom Gores in 1995. The firm focuses on leveraged buyout investments of established companies in the U.S., Europe and Asia. History Platinum Equity was founded in 199 ...

, in April 2008. In 2010, it was sold to U.S. Venture Partners, which merged Covad, and

into MegaPath. The three-way merger produced an executive team comprising the former

CEO A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

s of all three former companies: Chairman and CEO (former MegaPath CEO) D. Craig Young, Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Wholesale Markets (former Covad CEO) Pat Bennett, and (former Speakeasy CEO) Bruce Chatterley as President of the Business Markets unit in charge of all non-wholesale customer sales, service and marketing. In mid-2010, Covad announced Ethernet-over-Copper services (EoCu) in the LA market. The new Ethernet product ran over a Fujitsu Flashwave based Ethernet core and provided symmetrical speeds up to 20 Mbit/s. Ethernet over DS1 service was added soon after. In early 2011, Covad (now as Megapath) announced expansion of the services on a national level by the end of 2012. In September 2014,

announced its plan to buy the assets acquired from Covad from MegaPath. The acquisition was completed on January 1, 2015.

References

External links

Official homepage
of Global Capacity
Official homepage
of Covad Communications d/b/a Global Capacity
Covad Communications
at Platinum Equity {{Dot-com Bubble Dot-com bubble 1999 initial public offerings Internet service providers of the United States Private equity portfolio companies Technology companies based in the San Francisco Bay Area