AT&T looks to lure fiber subs with new pricing, unlimited data

Looking to bulk up its fiber subscriber base, AT&T has introduced new pricing on three tiers of its fiber-fed broadband service that can be had without service bundles or data usage caps and restrictions.

AT&T said it is launching the trio of new tiers and price points for new customers on October 4 "for customers feeling the effects of remote working and learning at home." Here's how they stack up:

• Internet 100: $35/month for a year, plus taxes and $10/month equipment fee
• Internet 300: $45/month for a year, plus taxes and $10/month equipment fee
• Internet 1000: $60/month for a year, plus taxes and $10/month equipment fee

All three tiers also come with unlimited Internet data. AT&T recently extended its data overage waiver for all consumer AT&T Fiber and AT&T Internet customers through the end of 2020. AT&T is also tossing in HBO Max, the new subscription VoD streaming service that currently sells for $14.99 per month.

Prior to the price update, AT&T Fiber customers could buy speeds up to 1 Gbit/s (Internet 1000) at a bundled rate of $39.99 per month for the first 12 months, or via a standalone rate of $49.99 for the first year. The built-in unlimited data allowance across all three tiers essentially removes an additional cost of $30 per month from the equation.

The price adjustment, which could accelerate signups, also enters the picture a few weeks after AT&T CEO John Stankey said fiber is on the company's front burner, though a good portion of that has to do with supporting 5G rather than underpinning consumer broadband services.

"Priority number one is to make sure that we're investing in our core businesses and that's fiber, and making sure that we have broadband connectivity on 5G," Stankey said last month at a Goldman Sachs investor conference.

But he did hint at more to come from AT&T Fiber, which added more than 220,000 customers in Q2 2020, extending that total to 4.3 million (with nearly 2 million on 1-Gig speeds). While that's sizable growth, a relatively recent study found that a good chunk of those new subscribers are actually existing AT&T customers upgrading to fiber rather than subs that AT&T stole from cable operators and other broadband rivals.

"There is clearly an easy path for us to think about a substantially larger fiber footprint than what we have today with returns that are as good as the great returns we've gotten from the first tranche of homes that we've built," Stankey said.

Related posts:

• AT&T goes nationwide with 5G
• AT&T Expands Fiber Footprint
• Bulk of AT&T Fiber Sub Growth Coming From AT&T – Analyst

— Jeff Baumgartner, Senior Editor, Light Reading, special to Broadband World News