Case Study: Roanoke Electric Cooperative achieves always-on rural connectivity for servicemen with Cradlepoint

Roanoke Electric Cooperative Leverages In-Vehicle Solution for Network Connectivity Anywhere

Roanoke Electric Cooperative (REC), a private utility serving more than 14,500 member-owners across over 2,000 miles of line, struggled to keep servicemen connected in very rural areas. USB hotspots provided limited Internet service, causing missed or lost work orders, phone calls or long trips back to the office (servicemen can handle up to 20 work orders per day), so REC engaged Cradlepoint and its NetCloud Service for Mobile delivered via ruggedized in-vehicle LTE routers (with dual‑modem SD‑WAN capability in some trucks).

Cradlepoint deployed cloud-managed NetCloud Service for mobile—routing, GPS/telematics, WiFi-as-WAN, zero-touch provisioning—and rugged in-vehicle routers (plus dual-modem docks for wireless failover/SD‑WAN). The result: constant WAN access that lets servicemen reliably receive emails and work orders, record and save reports from the vehicle for instant office visibility, use GPS for safety, and respond faster to member issues—reducing trips back to headquarters, saving significant field time and improving customer service. Cradlepoint also provides 24x7 support and hardware built for harsh environments.

Roanoke Electric Cooperative

Robin Hoggard-Harrell

Manager of Technical Services