Google Fiber announced plans to bring its mix of gigabit broadband and pay TV services to Salt Lake City about a year ago, and it’s now less than a year away from launching service there.
Google Fiber expects to light up services in portions of the city before the end of the year, according to Google Utah’s Devon Baer, The Salt Lake City Tribute reported last week.
The updated launch plan came amid the opening of a new Google Fiber store in Trolley Square.
Like it’s done in other cities, the ISP/TV provider will use a Fiber Rally deployment model to determine which parts of Salt Lake City get Google Fiber services first. Specific deployment details will be shared via a Web site Google Fiber has set up for that market.
Google Fiber will be competing for customers there with incumbents Comcast and CenturyLink.
Google Fiber has already launched service to parts of Kansas City, Kan.; Kansas City, Mo.; Provo, Utah; and Austin, Texas.
In addition to Salt Lake City, Google Fiber has also committed to deploy in Atlanta; San Antonio; Nashville, Tenn.; and Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham, N.C. It’s considering expansions in Chicago; Portland, Ore.; Los Angeles, San Jose, Irvine and San Diego, Calif.; Phoenix; Oklahoma City; Louisville, Ky.; and Jacksonville and Tampa, Fla.
Google Fiber has also begun to accelerate its moves into some markets by tapping into existing infrastructure (in San Francisco and Atlanta, for example), or to offer service on municipally-owned fiber networks (as it’s set to do in Huntsville, Ala.).
Google Fiber ended 2015 with about 53,000 video subs, according to a MoffettNathanson analyst Craig Moffett’s analysis of data culled from the U.S. Copyright Office.
