Comcast Business today will reach more California-based SMBs with afer extending its fiber-based network to the San Ramon business park, which is home to more than 167 commercial tenants.
Comcast Business said it has installed more than 1.5 miles of fiber (a mix of underground and aerial plant) there to the business community on the west side of Interstate 680, north of Deerwood Road. The network expansion, the result of a $250,000 investment, will provide businesses there with Ethernet capacity up to 10 Gbps, the operator said.
Comcast Business’s fiber network now spans 140,000 miles and ties into a 100 Gbps backbone.
Business services continue to be a bright spot for the MSO. Comcast pulled in business services revenues of $1.2 billion in the category, up 19.5% year-over-year, putting it on an annual run rate approaching $5 billion.
On yesterday’s earnings call, Comcast SVP and CFO Michael Cavanagh said more than 70% of those revenues are coming from small businesses, adding that the MSO is seeing an increase in businesses from mid-sized commercial customers.
“If you look under the hood at many of the businesses we’re targeting, they resemble an aggregation of small businesses -- those with brand systems such as banks, retailers, and restaurant chains,” he said. “In these cases, the needs of the local branches look very much like the small and medium-sized business customers we serve so well today.”
He added that Comcast is in the “early stages” of pursuing deals with larger enterprise businesses. Comcast announced last month that it had formed a new unit that will target Fortune 1000 companies, underpinned by network agreements with fellow MSOs such as Time Warner Cable, Charter Communications, Mediacom Communications, Cox Communications and Cablevision Systems.
