STATFlash: Fiber Lights Up the U.S. Business Landscape

Fiber availability increases to 64.5% for medium and large buildings

BOSTON, MA, April 8, 2020 – Availability of direct optical fiber connections to commercial sites is expanding across the U.S., according to latest ENS @Fiber Plus research from Vertical Systems Group. More than one million commercial buildings and data centers now have on-net access to fiber-based network services.

Two primary segments are tracked for the U.S. Fiber Lit landscape based on building size: Fiber 20+ (Medium/Large) and Fiber <20 (Small). The Fiber 20+ segment, which includes buildings with twenty or more employees, has a 64.5% fiber lit availability rate. This compares to 12.1% availability for the Fiber <20 segment, which includes buildings with fewer than twenty employees. Despite this availability gap, small buildings propelled growth in 2019 with the Fiber <20 segment accounting for more than two-thirds of new fiber lit sites.

Fiber lit buildings are strategic assets that provide competitive advantages such as faster and more profitable delivery of network services. Vertical Systems Group measures business fiber market leadership with annual Fiber LEADERBOARD benchmarks. Thirteen retail and wholesale providers attained a rank position on the 2019 U.S. Fiber Lit Buildings LEADERBOARD based on 10,000 or more on-net fiber lit commercial sites. Another twelve companies qualified for a citation on the 2019 Challenge Tier with between 2,000 and 9,999 lit buildings.

For this analysis, a fiber lit building is defined to include multi-tenant and company-owned commercial sites plus data centers that have on-net optical fiber connectivity to a network provider’s infrastructure, plus active service termination equipment onsite. Excluded from this analysis are standalone cell towers, small cells not located in fiber lit buildings, near net buildings, buildings classified as coiled at curb or coiled in building, HFC-connected buildings, carrier central offices, residential buildings, and private or dark fiber installations.

What’s in @Fiber Plus?

ENS @Fiber Plus research covers detailed fiber lit building counts and availability rates for the Fiber 20+ and Fiber <20 segments. Fiber 20+ content also includes annual data from 2004 for four building size segments based on employee counts: 20-50, 51-100, 101-250 and 251+ employees. Fiber Provider research covers U.S. fiber lit building counts for the top companies, fiber lit buildings penetration analysis by provider, Fiber LEADERBOARDs, and up to date details on M&A activity. The Fiber Market section provides insight on U.S. market demographics, key fiber trends, 5G impact, opportunities, benefits, challenges and more.

@Fiber Plus is available now exclusively to ENS Research Program subscribers. Industry-leading ENS cloud-based research includes market analysis, detailed tables, charts and infographics – plus expert analyst advisory support. Contact us for subscription information and pricing.

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