Great Basin: Northern Nevada's on-ramp to the Information Superhighway
by Zhizhong Li, Outpost staff
In 1994, Reno wasn't home to any Internet service providers. All that changed when Bruce Robertson established Great Basin Internet Services.
Robertson originally founded the company to just pay for his own Internet connection. But with the company's rapid growth, Robertson found out that Internet service was in high demand. He saw a brilliant future for his company.
"We have 7,901 customers right now, and it is still growing," said Dave Zybert, manager of parent company, Spider Internet Communications. "I know Great Basin is the largest. We feel we do a very good job here. We think we do a very honest and efficient job. We keep our equipment as close to peak technology as we can get, and our customers are by and large very happy."
With about 30 employees, Great Basin Internet Services in Reno is becoming a high-tech success story. Photo by Zhizhong Li |
Also, Great Basin is using Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL), the latest Internet access technology. This technology allows high-speed access to multiple workstations for a fraction of the cost of traditional access alternatives.
But the most important part of Great Basin's business is customer service.
"We are proud of our customer service," said Jeff Bjorklund, a web designer in charge of design at Spider. "We do the same job as other companies, except our customer service is exceptional."
At the same time, Great Basin is developing new technologies. For example, the homepage of Spider Internet Communications uses "flash" to put moving pictures together. That saves computer disk space.
As even more ISPs (Internet service providers) start-up in northern Nevada, Great Basin doesn't think the competition from them will inhibit its development. Great Basin's managers think more competition will just improve the company.
"I think if more companies came in the town doing what we do, it would only help us out because it is kind of like a club," Bjorklund said. "You want more members. You want more people who are knowledgeable about the Web and the Internet and Web design."
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But Bjorklund doesn't think it's good for a company to grow too large. More ISP companies can help prevent this.
"You want to be big, you want to be successful, but you don't want to be the monopoly," Bjorklund said. "Like Microsoft, people began to be afraid of it because you can't move anywhere without them watching what you do."
Great Basin employees are concerned about the company's future. The biggest obstacle facing the company now is the acceptance of the Internet.
Zybert thinks people who work in the computer industry can see the Internet is changing everything. But getting people out of the industry to accept that notion is sometimes difficult.
"There are still a large number of people who have not accepted inevitability of the Internet, the fact that it is bringing the world closer together," Zybert said. "They are afraid of changing."
Posted: February 14, 2000
Copyright 2000 Nevada Outpost
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