business

Google lights a prairie fire in Kansas

19 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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Kansas kicks it up.

Average Internet download speeds over the entire state of Kansas jumped by 86% in 2012, according to the State of the Internet tracking report from Akamai, a content delivery network pioneer.

To be sure, Akamai’s study relies on its own observed traffic and more or less ignores low speed, sub-256 Kbps connections, which would bring the average down. But its methodology is reasonably consistent across geographic markets and provides a fair basis for making comparisons.… More

Survey finds Google Fiber getting high take rates in Kansas City

12 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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If the hare has staying power, the tortoise will lose.

Google’s early results in Kansas City have to be giving incumbent carriers the shakes. According to a survey done by Bernstein Research, one-third of the homes in neighborhoods where Google is already offering Internet and television service have signed up. And even more are thinking about it.

Bernstein surveyed 200 homes in the relatively small area where Google Fiber is up and running. One-third were already taking the service and of the rest, about three-quarters were thinking about it.… More

Google's goad sinks a little deeper into Kansas City

7 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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Wanted in Grandview.

Grandview, Missouri is latest addition to Google’s wish list of Kansas City suburbs. The city council – board of aldermen as they call it in Missouri – took a no-brainer decision tonight to invite Google to expand its existing fiber to the home network into their community. Google’s response is to say thank you, but “it will still be awhile before we can build fiber in Grandview — we need to plan and engineer our network there first.”… More

Incumbent carriers' response is exactly what Google intended to provoke

6 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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Google’s fantastic fiber voyage on (a long) course to a happy ending.

In the same way the tiniest virus can trigger a massive flood of antibodies, Google’s willingness to bankroll competitive – and likely money-losing – fiber to the home projects in a handful of markets is rewriting capital investment plans at major carriers.

CenturyLink’s decision to build out an FTTH network in a limited area of Omaha is, as many have pointed out, a special case.… More

The Electric Blackberry Acid Test

5 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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“When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro.”

I was wrong to say that Blackberry CEO Thorsten Heins doesn’t seem to be the sort of CEO that might dabble in hallucinogens. First he claimed victory over Apple in the smart phone wars, and last week followed up with a declaration that tablets are dead.

We need Hunter S. Thompson. Now. He broke the ibogaine story in the 1972 presidential race and would quickly find any ambient pharmaceuticals floating through the Blackberry corporate ecosystem.… More

Intel's new captain must turn quickly

4 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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A titanic job ahead.

Sounding defensive about the future of personal computers, Brian Krzanich, Intel’s newly appointed CEO, told USA Today that he’s not giving up on that sector but he will be going after the mobile market with renewed vigor.

With PC numbers falling and mobile device sales exploding, Intel is losing its dominant position in the semiconductor industry. More efficient processors based on ARM technology are the standard in the mobile world. And now, ARM chip makers are about to make a major new move into another Intel bastion, server farms.… More

New T-Mobile launches D-Day assault on retail channels

3 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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Don’t worry if I’m a gone awhile. I’m on a mission.

The T-Mobile/MetroPCS merger was wrapped up this week and now the combined company is packing superior retail firepower.

MetroPCS sells on a no-contract and pre-paid basis, which meshes perfectly with T-Mobile’s business model. It was a good fit. T-Mobile gets three things out of the deal: spectrum, which it desperately needs, nine million customers and MetroPCS’s distribution channels. Over the next two or three years, MetroPCS subscribers will be transitioned off of their CDMA phones, and T-Mobile will light up the cleared spectrum with GSM and 4G services.… More

Fear and economics fuel CenturyLink's Omaha FTTH test

2 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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The case for fiber converges on Omaha.

After getting stung by Google in Provo, Utah, CenturyLink will roll out fiber-to-the-home service in Omaha, Nebraska. Two key factors that will drive future FTTH deployments make this announcement more than a marketing stunt.

First, CenturyLink is targeting a particular area served by pre-DOCSIS hybrid fiber and coaxial cable system, according to a story on the Telecompetitor news site. Instead of upgrading it with better coax or trying to refurbish it in place, CenturyLink is replacing it with gigabit passive optical network (GPON) technology.… More

FTTH price sensitivity looking similar in Britain and California

1 May 2013 by Steve Blum
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But not at any price, luv.

Last month, British Telecom rolled out a fiber-to-the-home offering that relied on just over half of its users paying somewhere in the $1,000 to $2,300 range for installation, and the rest paying more. Now PC Pro, a UK-based newsletter, reports that BT is backing away from its previous goal of getting FTTH into 25% of its subscriber’s homes.

The report quotes a BT source as linking the pull back to success with its fiber-to-the-cabinet (FTTC) offerings, which are already touted as being in the 40 to 80 Mbps range and could soon go as high as 100 Mbps.… More

AT&T gets the Googlefinger

9 April 2013 by Steve Blum
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I guess it’s just coincidence your suit fits too, Mr. Bond.

“Mr Bond, they have a saying in Chicago: Once is happenstance. Twice is coincidence. The third time it’s enemy action.”

AT&T is reacting to Google’s Austin announcement with the same paranoia that Auric Goldfinger eyed James Bond on their second, not-so-accidental meeting. The Texas capital is now positioned to get gigabit service from both companies.

It’s Google’s second venture into fiber to the home service, which could mean they just want to check results from what is still an experiment in Kansas City.… More