Cleveland is getting a big technology boost that should help the businesses and property owners along the burgeoning Health-Tech Corridor and beyond.

With a financial assist from the federal government, the city and nonprofit broadband supplier OneCommunity will install what U.S. Assistant Secretary of Commerce Jay Williams this morning called the first commercially available, 100-gigabit Internet connection in the country. It will run from downtown Cleveland to University Circle. A federal grant will cover $700,000 of the $1 million cost. The city of Cleveland is contributing $200,000 and OneCommunity is kicking in $100,000. The system will be run by Everstream, the for-profit arm of OneCommunity. “This public-private partnership will drive innovation and job creation for the city and regional businesses to support entrepreneurs and advance the region’s reputation as a destination for innovation,” Williams said during a news conference at the headquarters of Explorys Inc., a Cleveland Clinic spinoff located in the former Cleveland Playhouse complex on Carnegie Avenue in the corridor. Explorys is a cloud service for data analysis for health care institutions. “We need to make sure we have the infrastructure to be able to support those institutions,” said Dr. Anil Jain, Explorys’ chief medical officer and senior vice president. “If you’re going to work with big information, you need a big pipe.” Jain also said the link will attract information technology talent to Cleveland. “I can take the next job candidate coming here from Silicon Valley and tell him, ‘We have the first 100-gigabit network right here,’” he said. “You don’t have that in Silicon Valley.” Until now, this kind of advanced fiber-optic network has only been available to research institutions such as Case Western Reserve University. But the demand is growing for the transmission and cloud storage of video, financial data and health care information, so-called “big data.” Lev Gonick, CEO of OneCommunity, said commercial users today are connecting to one-gigabit networks or, perhaps, 10-gigabit networks. This new network is not designed for residential users at this time. The connection also is likely to boost real estate activity, and prices, along the Health-Tech Corridor, which has eight business incubators and more than 130 high-tech companies. “The MidTown Corridor and the Health-Tech Corridor have struggled as a No-Man’s Land; we’re no longer a No-Man’s Land,” said Scott Garson co-owner and lead developer of the Victory Building on Euclid Avenue. “We’ve lost tenants to downtown; we’ve lost tenants to the suburbs,” he said. “Now, those companies that moved to the suburbs may see (locating along the 100-gig line) as a competitive advantage.” Gonick said he expects construction of the network to start in January and to be up and running in six to eight months. OneCommunity will string fiber cable through the three-mile long corridor from the Idea Center at PlayhouseSquare to Case Western Reserve University at University Circle, with the direct coverage area stretching north-south from Chester to Carnegie avenues. Buildings and businesses outside this footprint will be able to connect to what Gonick calls “backbone” that his organization is constructing. Case Western Reserve and media company ideastream, in the Idea Center, are currently the two nodes that connect to an existing 100-gigabit network that connects research institutions in Ohio. Bill Winsininski, leasing director for the Bytegrid Cleveland Data Center, said the new, fast data connection will speed up his company’s buildout of its center in downtown Cleveland. Winsininski said the first, 50,000-square-foot phase of the 300,000-square-foot center is 95% leased, and he expects that the installation of the 100-gigabit line will push Phase 2 beyond another 50,000 square feet. Bytegrid last year bought the building at 1425 Rockwell Ave., and while it is outside the Health-Tech Corridor, its existing link with OneCommunity will give it access to the high-speed network. The city of Cleveland will use the new line as an economic development tool. “My first thing will be to get information about this network out to site selectors,” said Tracey Nichols, the city’s economic development director. “This will help attract film industry business, security companies and others.”