Horry Telephone Cooperative (HTC) is a telecommunications cooperative based in Horry County, South Carolina. HTC was founded in 1952 to serve the rural areas of Horry County where it was cost prohibitive for national telephone companies to provide service.
On August 2, 2012, HTC announced a 20-year naming rights deal for Coastal Carolina University's Student Recreation and Convocation Center. The facility will be called The HTC Center.
Products
- Telephone (incumbent local exchange carrier)
Since 1954, HTC has offered telephone service to the residents of Horry and Georgetown Counties in South Carolina. The cooperative first offered party line service and eventually transitioned its customers to private line service as facilities were upgraded. Following the deregulation of AT&T, Horry Telephone Cooperative was awarded the status of incumbent local exchange carrier.
- Long Distance
Because many of the beach areas were served by national providers such as GTE, Horry Telephone introduced Measured Extended area service (MEAS) in 1988 to reduce the cost of phone calls between the western portion of Horry County and the beach areas. This was expanded to include full long distance service under the name Horry Telephone Long Distance. National long distance service was first offered in 1992 by HTC Communications, Inc.
- Competitive local exchange carrier
In 1998, HTC Communications, Inc., received approval from the South Carolina Public Service Authority to offer local telephone service to additional areas of Horry and Georgetown Counties as a competitive local exchange carrier.
- Cable TV
HTC Cablevision is the brand name of cable television service from HTC. Cable TV was added to menu to bring the service to the rural areas of Horry County where national firms would not provide service. HTC Cablevision offers digital cable service, premium channels (HBO, Showtime, etc.) and pay-per-view service.
- Internet
HTC offers both dial-up Internet service and HTC Netracer, broadband Internet service. HTC began offering local dial-up Internet in 1995. HTC Netracer is the name for both DSL and cable modem offerings depending on the customer's service area.
- Mobile phone
Through a partnership with Cingular, now AT&T Mobility, HTC offers mobile phone service under the HTC Horizon brand. The cooperative began offering service in 1997. HTC Horizon also offers paging, though that technology is being phased out.
- Telephone directories
In a deal expected to be complete by September 30, 2012, HTC purchased Data Publishing Inc., a division of Hargray Communications. The company has published HTC's print directories since 2003 and publishes other directories in the Southeastern United States. Operations will remain in Hilton Head, South Carolina, though HTC hopes to add Internet and mobile versions of its products.
Fiber to the home
HTC began the roll out of fiber-to-the-home to customers in 2006 under the brand name HTC Bluewave. Fiber to the Home offers larger amounts of bandwidth which allows more cable TV channels and faster Internet to be delivered to the customer. Bluewave powered HTC Netracer offerings differ from the DSL and cable modem alternatives by offering symmetrical speeds for upload and download.
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