Network technology vendor Calix has announced a deal with fiber consortium Conexon, in the US, which will see the pair target electric utilities with Calix’s suite of CPE, support software, and infrastructure services. Conexon is the first member of the new Calix Partner Community, and Calix hopes it will prove a lucrative channel to a market of over 800 electric cooperatives – 200 of which are already providing broadband to their customers. Key to this is the upcoming Rural Digital Opportunity Fund (RDOF) from the FCC, which is a $20 billion investment vehicle that intends to close the digital divide between urban and rural areas. Faultline has previously covered the RDOF in the context of SpaceX’s Starlink project, but the…