AT&T announced this morning the telecom company will launch on Monday, May 18, its high-speed Internet service GigaPower to area residents and small businesses.

Joelle Phillips, AT&T Tennessee president, joined Mayor Karl Dean at downtown's AT&T Tower in making the announcement, which comes about a year after AT&T made its initial GigaPower plan known.

Phillips did not disclose a specific cost to get operational in the Nashville area the ultra-high-speed fiber-optic service, which AT&T bills as providing upload and download broadband speeds up to one gigabit per second.

However, during the last three years, the capital investment of AT&T Tennessee has topped $1.2 billion, she said.

"That level of investment is not something any company decides to do without taking a lot of thought and weighing several factors," Phillips said. "Key factors for us include the leadership and public policy decisions from the states that we are considering investments."

Phillips recognized the work of the engineers and construction teams climbing poles and navigating through tons of underground conduits and wires to install the network.

"It's a big job," she said. "It takes the talent and the focus of every one of the 5,500 AT&T employees in Tennessee to put this network together."

Dean cited jobs as a key element of the AT&T service.

"There are still many job openings here," Dean said. "By rolling out GigaPower, AT&T is helping us bring more employers to the city."

AT&T announced in April 2014 it would bring its GigaPower service to as many as 100 U.S. cities. In July, it selected Nashville and Winston-Salem and Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina. The service already was offered in Dallas, Austin and Fort Worth, Texas.

Three months after tapping Nashville, AT&T said it would cease with fiber investments, citing the potential for tighter federal regulations being imposed upon Internet service providers. Then in December, the company said its efforts were back on the table.

In January, AT&T officially re-announced GigaPower would be offered in Nashville, Atlanta and Charlotte among 12 other new cities (read here).

Of note, Comcast announced May 6 it will launch in the Nashville market by month's end Gigabit Pro, with speeds of two gigabits per second. Similarly, Google announced in January (read here) it is planning to offer its Google Fiber in Nashville, Atlanta, Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham.

An AT&T release from July 2014 notes the following:

"The AT&T GigaPower network will provide services offered over an all fiber network featuring symmetrical upload and download broadband speeds up to 1 Gigabit per second, and AT&T's most advanced TV services to consumers and businesses."