(WASHINGTON) – The President of the Fiber to the Home Council Americas, Heather Burnett Gold, made the following statement today in reaction to news from AT&T that it will invest $14 billion over the next three years to upgrade its broadband networks to support growing customer demand for high-speed Internet access. The company said that the investment will include $6 billion to upgrade wireline infrastructure, including fiber deployments to 1 million additional business customer locations:
We welcome AT&T’s announcement to deploy more fiber in its networks as part of its effort to satisfy the ever-accelerating need for speed among both consumer and business broadband customers. By running fiber directly to more commercial properties and cell towers, and setting the pace for other providers to follow, this initiative will go a long way toward ensuring that U.S. wireline and wireless networks lead the world in broadband capacity and performance – because fiber makes all the difference. We applaud the company’s leadership role in ‘fibering up’ America and hope that the company will soon augment its strategy with an initiative to connect individual homes directly into fiber networks, which we believe is an essential step for igniting the innovation economy of the future.
About the FTTH Council Americas
Now in its 12th year, the Fiber to the Home (FTTH) Council is a non-profit association consisting of companies and organizations that deliver video, Internet and/or voice services over high-bandwidth, next-generation, direct fiber optic connections – as well as those involved in planning and building FTTH networks. Its mission is to accelerate deployment of all-fiber access networks by demonstrating how fiber-enabled applications and solutions create value for service providers and their customers, promote economic development and enhance quality of life. More information about the Council can be found at www.ftthcouncil.org.
