Tom Whitaker Email & Phone Number

Fairfield, Va, Us

Fairfield, Va, Us

Richmond, Virginia, Us

Working along side an amazing team of committed professionals. On a mission to bring fiber broadband internet service to the most underserved folks in 23 rural Virginia Counties.

Herndon, Va, Us

Consulting with over member cooperatives and companies in 48 States with broadband initiatives and projects.

Edinburg, Virginia, Us

On July 1 2021 I retired from Shentel after over 16 years, coincident with the T-Mobile transaction. Best of luck to a great company and greater people that make Shentel best of breed. My time there was a joy and a privilege...After leading a great cross functional team to stand up our new FTTH brand, Glo Fiber, I moved into a corporate role supporting Corporate Development ahead of my retirement from Shentel in July of 2021. The "new Shentel" (Sprint wireless network and customers sold to T-Mobile) emerges as the leading broadband provider in the mid-Atlantic region. Shentel Cable in VA, WV, MD and Kentucky. Glo Fiber in VA, WV, MD and Central PA. And Beam Fixed Wireless Broadband, offering carrier grade wireless internet to rural customers in the same region. Shentel is a model for successful rural telecom. Focused on the customer, quality of service and technology to find value in our brand...

Edinburg, Virginia, Us

Shentel has over 6000 miles of regional fiber, bisecting many small towns and cities throughout the region. We are focusing on leveraging these underutilized assets, to offer internet choice in these under-served towns under a new brand "Glo Fiber".

Edinburg, Virginia, Us

Shentel acquired Ntelos Wireless in May of 2016. Up to and through acquisition and transition, Ed, Willy and I were focused on our areas of functional expertise. After January 1, 2017 we will roll back to our segment based organization. Ed McKay will lead engineering and wire-line, Willy Pirtle will lead Wireless and I will support the Cable/Broadband business unit.

Edinburg, Virginia, Us

Shentel reorganized into a line of business organization in August 2013. As VP of Cable I was focused on all aspects of our Cable business ($84M revenue or 26% of total revenue 2014). Shentel Cable operates in Virginia, West Virginia and Western Maryland passing over 200,000 homes. We offer video, internet and VOIP services throughout our service territory.

Edinburg, Virginia, Us

Responsible for all areas of Operations at Shentel ($327M revenue 2013) including; Wireless development and operations, Cable operations including construction and project management, legacy local Telco operations including central office, installation and repair for local voice, video and internet operations (CATV, cable modem, DSL, Ethernet, RFOG, POTS, VOIP) and Network Operations Center operations (NOC).

Edinburg, Virginia, Us

Responsible for Converged Services Operations which included a CLEC business supporting the former NTC private CATV operations in college student MDU environments. Moved into VP role in 2011 at Shentel.

Shentel was an investor in NTC in 2002. In 2004, Shentel acquired all of NTC and rolled it into their other core business units. Very lucky to be in the right place at the right time. The Shentel acquisition opened the door to a truly great regional operator and family.NTC specialized in providing voice, video and internet communications to students living in off campus student housing, apartments and on campus dormitories. The core business was located in and around James Madison University and Virginia Tech. Other off campus locations in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi and Maryland were added between 2002 and 2004.

Broadslate was a start up provider of data services for small to mid sized businesses, offering SDSL service via a data CLEC model. Responsible for all operations include network development and ongoing operations, NOC, maintenance, repair and installation support. Our network was an Alcatel-Lucent SONET network collocated in over 350 central offices (CO's) in 15 states with 8 different RBOC's. Broadslate ceased operations in early 2002. Risk plays a role in every career decision. Stay where you are, move on, start your own business...these are all risk decisions. Accept that risk going into the decision and own it. It's all on you whether it works out, or not.Knowing what I know now and the outcome at Broadslate, I would do it all over again for the experience and relationships.

Waynesboro, Va, Us

After years as a contractor, I pursued and landed a job with an operator. Hired by CFW Wireless/Ntelos in 1996 to build the first digital PCS network in rural Virginia. Responsible for vendor evaluation and selection, network design, site acquisition, construction, integration, test and turn up of a 400 site Motorola digital PCS network with MTSO's in 2 States. Ntelos was a greenfield start up built on the PCS spectrum auctioned in 1995-96. The network included tier 3 markets like Charlottesville, Roanoke and Lynchburg VA and expanded to include all of WV in 1999.In August of 2015, Shentel announced the acquisition of Ntelos which closed in May 2016. 20 years after being hired by Ntelos as their 2nd wireless employee, we had the unique privilege of putting two great operations teams together under the Sprint brand.

Nat-Com was a design/build telecommunications construction company started by former Henkels and McCoy managers focused on telecommunications design and general construction . We designed and built cell sites, data rooms and clean environments and specialized in fiber facility construction. While a partner at Nat-Com we built over 100 fiber optic regeneration facilities for US Sprint and hundreds of cell sites for BAMS (now Verizon), Metrophone (now AT&T), Alltel Mobile (now Verizon) and others. I was a partner with a handful of engineers and construction professionals who started this company from nothing. One of those partners was James Brown of Plymouth Meeting PA. A great man and wonderful mentor. We all put up our houses for equity in a small business loan to fund the business until we were on our feet. It took longer then we hoped but finally within about a year, we landed a significant wireless project in Northern NJ. Wireless as an industry started to boom, cellular, paging and trunked radio. We were in the right place at the right time, and incredibly lucky.

Project Manager working primarily on Sprint Fiber Optic facilities projects. Responsible for estimating, bid analysis, on site project management and construction management. On the road almost full time while with this company. Building primarily fiber optic regeneration facilities and Points of Presence (POP's) for Sprint who was building their nationwide optical network within railroad rights of way. Pouring concrete, pulling & splicing fiber and having a blast every day.

Blue Bell, Pa, Us

During the summer while in college, I worked for NJ Bell Telephone (Verizon) as a summer intern. There were 3 things an intern was allowed to do. Disconnects, prewires and coin box/payphone collections. All 3 of those tasks are officially extinct. H&M had a management training program. So with a couple of summers of telecommunications internships under my belt, H&M figured they had little to lose by offering me a job. I started with H&M after graduating from West VA Wesleyan College. I worked in the field, mainly as a "lineman" for about 3 years. On a variety of projects I was involved in plant construction, copper and optical. A little bit of everything. It was a great opportunity and a great start in the industry.

Graduate Degree In Leadership, Business Administration, Management And Operations

Bachelor Of Applied Science (B.A.Sc.), Biology, General