Telecom company acquires local exchange carrier business

Hammer Fiber Optics Holdings Corp., a Point Pleasant Beach telecommunications company, has agreed to acquire 1stPoint Communications LLC and its subsidiaries, including Open Data Centers LLC and Endstream Communications LLC.

The company, which does business as Hammer Communications, said in a news release that all parties have signed a letter of intent to conduct the transaction.

Hammer operates a fixed wireless network, offering internet, television and voice services in Atlantic County. It also offers carrier-class services through a fiber-optic network in New Jersey and neighboring New York and Pennsylvania. It recently began offering cloud hosting and related services.

Piscataway-based 1stPoint is a local exchange carrier that offers services such as texting and carrier switching. Endstream offers voice services, while Open Data Centers operates a colocation facility in Piscataway.

“We are proud of how far we have been able to take Hammer in the past few quarters,” founder Mark Stogdill said in a prepared statement. “We look forward to how much further these acquisitions will move us in our plans. With the acquisition of 1stPoint’s (competitive local exchange carriers) and commercial mobile radio services, we will be able to grow the wireless residential access platform and look toward a national network.

“In addition, the Open Data Centers facility in Piscataway, along with its server and switching platforms, is a significant addition to our core infrastructure to support major growth in the cloud and hosting markets.”

Financial terms of the transaction, and a projected closing date, were not disclosed.

“The acquisition is an ideal combination of intellectual property, creates a very strong management team and offers operational synergies for Hammer,” 1stPoint CEO Erik Levitt said in a prepared statement. “Hammer will not only have the benefit of the exclusive rights to the patented AIR wireless technology, but also to 1stPoint’s switching technology, its underlying CLECs and its commercial mobile radio services operator.”