Fiber Connects More NA Homes Than DSL

When it comes to North American residential subscribers, in 2018 fiber take-rates outpaced DSL for the first time, according to research released today.

That places fiber second only to cable (coax), found the "North American 2018 Advanced Broadband Report," researched by RVA LLC for Fiber Broadband Association. The hunger for fiber continues to grow, whereas desire -- from operators, developers, and end-customers -- for cable coax is fading somewhat, said Mike Render, president of RVA during the report's debut today in an FBA webinar.

"We expect the gap between coax and fiber to continue to narrow as we go forward," he said, noting fiber broadband providers now have almost 41 million homes passed and marketed in the United States. (Homes marketed, which represent 40.8 million, means the number of houses or multi-dwelling units that have fiber "in the area but, for one reason or another, may not be able to be connected to fiber," Render explained. In an MDU, for example, the fiber may be deployed to the apartment next door, but another building's owner contracted with a telco using Gfast and copper to deliver broadband, he said.)

This year alone, providers deployed fiber to 5.9 million homes marketed, according to RVA. In an apples-to-apples comparison, the second-highest rollout year was 2007: At that time, operators reached 4.2 million, the research firm found. Next year, however, the surge will decrease as AT&T's fiber deployment, said Render.

"We do expect that growth will go down a little bit, primarily because AT&T is a big player. In 2018 they're getting close to finishing, in the middle of next year, a build they committed to the FCC... " he said. "We are expecting that one player to create some small declines."

Tier 1 operators are few and powerful, but the 1,000-plus smaller providers across the United States alone have a commanding presence, according to RVA. This year, they accounted for 29% of fiber builds, the report showed (versus 71% for tier one providers). RVA has tracked this data point since 2004: It's been steadily growing since 2014 and is the highest point ever.

Breaking down the type of provider is interesting, too. Tier 1 ILECs dominate, accounting for 72.6% of residential fiber rollouts in the US this year. Smaller ILECs represented 10.3%, followed by CLECs and then MSOs, which delivered 5.5% of residential fiber. Public municipalities provided fiber to 3.7%, while real-estate development integrators accounted for 1.1%, RVA found. Finally, rural electric coops deployed fiber to 0.5% of US homes -- a percentage that's small but growing, Render said.

"Take rates have been so spectacular they can see a business case here," he added. "We expect some pretty good growth out of that segment."

Although residential customers may be spread thin, fiber optic cables are ideal for other customers -- including distributed energy such as solar or wind, agriculture, forestry and government, said Render.

Related posts:

• Why Fiber Matters for the Modern Home
• Sensing New Fiber Optic Opportunities
• You Got Fiber, but No Cupcakes or Unicorns

— Alison Diana, Editor, Broadband World News. Follow us on Twitter or @alisoncdiana.