CenturyLink said it has deployed its fiber-based, symmetrical 1-Gig broadband service to residences and businesses in parts of six more states, and is on track to its gigabit offering available to about 700,000 homes by the end of 2015.
With the latest state additions (parts of Arizona, Idaho, Iowa, New Mexico, North Carolina and South Dakota), CenturyLink now offers the service in 17 states. Others include Washington, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Missouri, Ohio, and Florida. CenturyLink kicked off gigabit services in Omaha in 2013.
CenturyLink’s 1-Gig network and service expansions come as it and other telcos come under more competitive pressure cable operators that are using a mix of DOCSIS 3.0- and fiber-based technologies to deliver gigabit speeds. On the horizon is DOCSIS 3.1, a multi-gigabit platform for HFC networks.
“We said from the very beginning that we weren’t going to just talk about bringing gigabit speeds to our customers, but that we were going to deliver these speeds now. That’s exactly what we’ve done,” Shirish Lal, CenturyLink chief marketing officer, said in a statement. “Consumers and small businesses are ready for a broadband service that is capable of keeping up with today’s bandwidth demands. With the proliferation of the Internet of Things and the connection of everyday objects to the Internet and to one another, we are pleased to deliver speeds that can support these new technologies.”
CenturyLink is also deploying its pay TV service, Prism TV, through its fiber optic network. It has launched Prism TV in Seattle, La Crosse and Platteville, Wis.; Columbia and Jefferson City, Mo.; Tallahassee and central and southwest Florida; Las Vegas; central N.C.; Phoenix; Omaha, Neb.; Denver and Colorado Springs, Colo.; Portland; Salt Lake City; and Minneapolis.
CenturyLink, which is developing an OTT service that can be offered in and out of wireline footprint, ended the second quarter with 258,000 Prism TV customers.
