Almost four months later, Christensen finds himself operating an open network, allowing yet another Internet/phone/television provider to service iProvo customers.

Brandon Grover, chief executive of Nuvont Communications, said a plan for Broadweave to acquire his company's Provo customers collapsed recently. "I can't go into specifics," Grover said. "Both companies worked in good faith, but at the end of the day we couldn't reach an agreement."

Nuvont will continue to provide service to its 2,300 iProvo customers - less than a quarter of the total iProvo customer base - through the network that Broadweave now controls.

Attempts to contact Christensen were unsuccessful.

Clayton Blackham, a spokesman for Broadweave, said the South Jordan-based telecommunications company dropped the Nuvont deal because it didn't need the company anymore. "After operating the network for two months, Broadweave hit its goals for profitability. It didn't need Nuvont and it didn't want to take on its debt."

Blackham said Broadweave hopes to win over Nuvont subscribers to its service.

Provo Municipal Councilman George Stewart said although he is anxious, he is confident Broadweave can succeed where the city failed.

"I think they have enough retail customers with MStar [another iProvo provider] to provide service as both a retailer and a wholesale provider," Stewart said. "I would have preferred for the customers and Broadweave to have 100 percent of the customers in the market."

Broadweave planned to merge with Veracity Networks, another iProvo provider, but that deal fell through, as well. Drew Peterson, Veracity's chief executive, earlier said that Broadweave did not meet certain requirements by June 30, the day Provo and Broadweave were to close the deal.

The city and Broadweave signed the closing documents, but placed the transaction in escrow as Sorensen Capital, the firm bankrolling Broadweave's purchase, began its own examination of the deal.

Jacob Moon, a Sorensen spokesman, said the review is proceeding and probably will be completed by Sept. 1. He would not comment on what impact Nuvont's decision will have on Sorensen's analysis.

dmeyers@sltrib.com