The top 17 U.S. cable operators and telcos, representing 94% of the market, acquired more than 700,000 net new broadband subs in the third quarter, despite a market that would appear to be on the verge of saturation, Leichtman Research Group found in its latest report on the category.
Total broadband adds in the third quarter amounted to 135% from those in the year-ago quarter, extending the total sub count in the category beyond 86.6 million.
Cable took the lion’s share, adding about 581,000 broadband in the third quarter, or 83% of the net adds in the quarter, versus the top telcos, which added almost 121,000 broadband subs in the quarter, up from 80,000 in the year-ago period.
The top cable MSOs ended the quarter with 51.2 million broadband subs, compared to 35.4 million among the biggest telcos.
LRG said top U.S. ISPs added about 2.93 million broadband subs over the past year, outpacing the 2.54 million added during the prior year, and just a smidge above 2.925 million added two years ago.
“Despite there being 86.6 million broadband subscribers in the US via major cable and Telco providers, the industry has added subscribers at a faster pace over the past year than it did over the prior year,” said Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for LRG, in a statement. “Over the past year, cable companies accounted for 86% of the 2.9 million net broadband adds.”
