AT&T (NYSE: T) U-verse has hit the 400,000 living unit milestone Kansas City market with its U-verse service five years after launching the service in the area.
But the more page-turning news about AT&T is that it is going to let Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) use the telco's utility poles in Missouri and Kansas for its much higher speed 1 Gbps service.
Competing against regional cable operator Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC), AT&T launched its U-verse service in Kansas City in March 2007. Since 2008, the service provider said it has increased the amount of households that can access U-verse, and that it is now available to nearly 45 percent of the households in Kansas City's designated market area.
Google, of course, will become the new challenger to both AT&T and Time Warner Cable via its Google Fiber pilot project, one that will test what applications and services can be delivered over a 1 Gpbs Fiber to the Premises (FTTP)-based network. Under the terms of the agreement, AT&T will let Google rent space on its utility poles to hang its fiber cables.
Neither AT&T nor Google would provide specific details other than to say that they have reached an agreement.
While Google is the new kid on Kansas City's broadband block, the Internet search giant will be able to offer consumers and businesses service speeds that are significantly higher than can be delivered on AT&T's hybrid copper/fiber Fiber to the Node (FTTN) infrastructure.
Complementing the much-needed pole agreements Google established with AT&T and the Unified Government of Wyandotte County/Kansas City, Kan. will be a fiber edging device that it says will enable it to connect homes quicker to its 1 Gbps network. As reported in FierceCable, the edging device, which is similar to wall molding, could create a path from demarcation points near AT&T telephone poles to the optical network terminals (ONT) located on the side of a consumer's home.
For more:
- see the U-verse release
- Kansas City Journal has this article
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