The CEO of a bankrupt rural broadband provider took the witness stand under oath for the first time in October, defending his company's finances as it fights over a provisional $103 million federal Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) award. David Lindauer, who leads Maverix Broadband, testified on October 30 that he believes the company has been operationally profitable pretty much every year it has operated, even as it moved through bankruptcy proceedings the same day.
CEO Defends Company's Finances Under Oath
According to BusinessDen, attorney Patrick Akers questioned Lindauer on October 30 about why Maverix LLC filed for bankruptcy, and Lindauer testified that CooperReilly was attempting to take the company's assets for less than 50% of the offers it had previously received. Maverix Broadband, described in the reporting as a rural provider, is now asking a judge to reverse the state's decision concerning its provisional $103 million federal BEAD award. The bankruptcy filing and the grant fight are unfolding on parallel tracks, with Lindauer's sworn testimony offering the first detailed public account of the company's side of the story.
The dispute traces back to September, when the Colorado Broadband Office canceled numerous Maverix contracts totaling more than $100 million, according to The Colorado Sun. At the time, Maverix held six active state contracts for fiber projects in small towns including Kiowa, Livermore and Walsenburg, and the planned projects could have brought internet service of at least 100 megabits per second to more than 15,000 households and businesses.
State Alleges Millions in Unpaid-For Work
The state's inquiry began after it received two whistleblower reports about Maverix in late May, according to Broadband Communities. The Colorado Broadband Office estimated that about $9.17 million had been paid to Maverix before the state froze payments, and that roughly $3.2 million of that went toward invoices Maverix later canceled or work that was never performed, per the Colorado Sun's reporting. That $9.17 million figure is separate from the $103 million in provisional federal BEAD funding Maverix had been awarded; the broadband office has said no BEAD contracts with Maverix were signed and no BEAD funding was ever disbursed to the company.
Maverix has pushed back hard against the state's conclusions. The company said it disputed every calculation, determination and finding in the Comprehensive Monitoring Report dated September 21, 2026, and that it had been responding and providing hundreds of documents to state officials for months before that report ever landed, the Colorado Sun reported. “We dispute the findings in their entirety,” the company said, according to the same outlet.
Referral to Investigators and a Court Fight Over Procedure
Colorado has also taken the matter beyond its own broadband office. The state referred its investigation into Maverix to the Colorado Bureau of Investigation and the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Office of the Inspector General, the Colorado Sun reported. Separately, the Colorado Office of Information Technology said it would pursue recovery of $3.2 million in grant funds — $2.5 million in federal dollars and $700,000 in state dollars — through ongoing receivership and bankruptcy proceedings.
Maverix, for its part, has taken its objections to court. The company asked the United States District Court for the District of Colorado to reverse the state's decision affecting its provisional $103 million federal BEAD award, arguing that the state failed to follow required procedures. That procedural argument is now at the center of Maverix's request that a federal judge order the provisional $103 million federal BEAD award restored, according to Law360.
A Crew Still Working in Boulder
Even as the legal and financial fights play out in court filings and sworn testimony, the on-the-ground work tied to Maverix's rural broadband push has continued in some form. BusinessDen's reporting included a photograph by RJ Sangosti showing Jose Castanon, a member of a crew installing broadband in Boulder, preparing to feed cable underground through a pipe — a glimpse of the physical infrastructure work underlying a dispute now playing out largely in courtrooms and bankruptcy filings.
