AT&T fiber locations now reach 52 major metro markets, with the addition of 8 new markets, the company announced today. AT&T markets their gigabit service as AT&T Internet 1000 in these fiber fed locations, which began in Austin, Texas in 2013.
The new markets include Dayton, Ohio; Macon, Georgia; Madison, Wisconsin; Monterey-Salinas, California; Savannah, Georgia; South Bend, Indiana; Springfield, Missouri; and Western Michigan. With these additions, AT&T says their FTTP service is now available to 4.6 million locations.
They plan to add 2 million additional locations in 2017, on their path towards 12.5 million locations by mid-2019. AT&T claims the largest FTTP footprint across their 21-state region. This fiber expansion is driven in part by FCC mandated merger conditions associated with the approval of their DIRECTV acquisition.
“While other providers have slowed deployment, we’ll continue to expand access to our ultra-fast internet to more customers, so they can more quickly connect to the things they love online,” said Eric Boyer, senior vice president, Wireless and Wired Product Marketing at AT&T in a press release.
Boyer is most likely referring to Google fiber, who was once the ‘poster child’ for FTTP expansion, but has since stopped their once very ambitious fiber broadband roll out. FTTP expansion does continue beyond AT&T though, driven in large part by smaller tier 3 providers and municipal broadband providers.
