Focus Broadband (stylized as FOCUS Broadband), formerly Atlantic Telephone Membership Corporation (ATMC), is a member-owned, non-profit
cooperative that provides telecommunications services in southeastern
North Carolina. It is the largest member-owned cooperative in North Carolina and one of the largest in the United States.
ATMC was founded in 1955 by citizens of Brunswick County who were without telephone service [1] and was the tenth such cooperative organized in North Carolina. [2] Using a $381,000 loan from the Rural Electrification Administration, many rural sections of the county received modern phone service for the first time. [3] It added cable television service in the 1980s, becoming the first co-op in the state to provide TV to its members, [4] and Internet in the 1990s. [5] After receiving an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant, it expanded into parts of Columbus County in 2011; [1] in 2019, the company obtained a new $25 million grant to lay fiber-optic cables to connect rural areas of that County. [5]
In December 2021, ATMC announced it would change its name to Focus Broadband, reflecting a new emphasis on broadband as its primary service offering. [6]
Focus Broadband (stylized as FOCUS Broadband), formerly Atlantic Telephone Membership Corporation (ATMC), is a member-owned, non-profit
cooperative that provides telecommunications services in southeastern
North Carolina. It is the largest member-owned cooperative in North Carolina and one of the largest in the United States.
ATMC was founded in 1955 by citizens of Brunswick County who were without telephone service [1] and was the tenth such cooperative organized in North Carolina. [2] Using a $381,000 loan from the Rural Electrification Administration, many rural sections of the county received modern phone service for the first time. [3] It added cable television service in the 1980s, becoming the first co-op in the state to provide TV to its members, [4] and Internet in the 1990s. [5] After receiving an American Recovery and Reinvestment Act grant, it expanded into parts of Columbus County in 2011; [1] in 2019, the company obtained a new $25 million grant to lay fiber-optic cables to connect rural areas of that County. [5]
In December 2021, ATMC announced it would change its name to Focus Broadband, reflecting a new emphasis on broadband as its primary service offering. [6]