01  ·  How the internet works

The network
beneath
everything.

The internet is physical. Submarine cables cross the oceans, long-haul fiber crosses the continents, and the routes meet at internet exchange points where the world's traffic changes hands. Every search, every stream, and now every AI model runs on this infrastructure. Scroll to follow one signal from orbit to your front door.

02  ·  Above the ground

Space and ground,
one system.

Satellites extend reach where cable can't go: ships, aircraft, remote farms and villages. Every signal still lands at a ground station and hands off to fiber, because light in glass is faster and cheaper per bit than radio through the sky. Orbit and earth work as a single network, and AI traffic rides the same handoff.

Orbital pathsGround stationsFiber handoff
03  ·  The backbone

Long-haul fiber
carries the
continent.

This is the backbone: high-capacity, long-haul fiber routes that link cities and the exchange points between them. Regional networks plug into it to reach everywhere else. Training and inference move enormous datasets between facilities, and that traffic needs its own private, low-latency lanes. Follow one signal east, toward the buildings where the models live.

04  ·  The data center

Where networks
meet compute.

A data center puts connectivity, compute, and storage under one roof. Websites, cloud services, and AI models all live here. Traffic arrives on fiber, servers and GPUs do the work, and the answer returns to the network the way it came.

Inside the data center

Where
intelligence
is made.

Racks of GPUs and network gear, cooled and powered with care, lit by the same connectivity that crossed the ocean a moment ago. A model is only as fast as the fiber that feeds it.

Inbound fiberGPU computeTraining & inferenceOutbound
05  ·  The last mile

The final
connection
is local.

The last mile is the final stretch between a local hub and the customer: fiber to the home, cable, fixed wireless, or a mobile tower. Regional and local networks branch to offices, businesses, and homes, and it is often the most expensive part of the network to build per customer. The assistant on a phone, the model running on a laptop, the clinic uploading scans overnight: the global system introduced at the start is what makes them ordinary.

06  ·  Who builds and owns it

The standard for
North American
connectivity.

We acquire, consolidate, and scale the networks that connect the continent — wireless, fiber, and broadband infrastructure, unified into one institutional platform.

Connectivity is essential infrastructure. Its ownership is still extraordinarily fragmented.

Technology  ·  Archimedes

Run on the AI operating system we built ourselves.

Standard is not simply a private equity firm. Archimedes — our proprietary AI platform — runs the complete investment lifecycle, from the first signal to the last LP statement.

Explore Archimedes →
ORBITBACKBONEDATA CENTERLOCAL
Common questions

How the internet works, in short.

The short answers behind the story above. Open any question to read more.

How does the internet physically work?
Data travels as light through fiber optic cables and as radio waves over wireless links. Submarine cables connect continents, long-haul fiber connects cities, data centers store and process the data, and local networks carry it the final stretch to homes and businesses.
What is the internet backbone?
The backbone is the set of high-capacity, long-haul fiber routes that link major cities and internet exchange points. Regional and local networks connect to it to reach the rest of the world.
Do satellites replace fiber?
No. Satellites extend coverage to places cable cannot reach economically, but every satellite link still lands at a ground station that connects to fiber. Space and ground operate as one network.
What does a data center do?
A data center houses the servers, storage, and network equipment that run websites, apps, cloud services, and AI models. Fiber brings traffic in, computers do the work, and the result goes back out over the same network.
What is the last mile?
The last mile is the final segment of the network between a local hub and the customer, delivered by fiber to the home, cable, fixed wireless, or mobile networks. It is often the most expensive part of a network to build per customer.