AT&T ramps North Carolina FTTP workforce to battle Google Fiber's impending entry

Just days after Google Fiber (NASDAQ: GOOG) announced it would bring its fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) service to a number of major North Carolina towns and cities, including Charlotte and the Triangle area, AT&T (NYSE: T) is ramping up its workforce to support its own fiber network push in the state.

After launching its 1 Gbps FTTP GigaPower service in December in Carrboro, Cary, Chapel Hill, Raleigh and Winston-Salem, the service provider said it is committing capital dollars to hire nearly 100 new technician positions to support the service rollout. The service provider also is planning to bring the 1 Gbps service to Durham, Charlotte and Greensboro.

Besides the technician positions, the service provider is looking to fill nearly 200 business sales and call center positions in North Carolina. In 2014, AT&T filled 900 jobs in the state.

According to a report in the Charlotte Business Journal, nearly 20 of the new employees AT&T will hire will be based the Charlotte region, one of the next areas where it will deliver the FTTP service. However, the telco has not revealed when it will officially launch service in Charlotte.  

Last year, AT&T struck an agreement with North Carolina Next Generation Network (NCNGN), a regional initiative focused on stimulating the deployment of next-generation networks to North Carolina, to deliver its U-verse GigaPower offering to six communities, including Carrboro, Cary, Chapel Hill, Durham, Raleigh and Winston-Salem.

AT&T executives have said North Carolina's GigaPower customer base has exceeded expectations, but have not yet revealed how many customers are using the service.

North Carolina is part of a broader buildout plan AT&T has hatched to bring FTTP services up to 100 cities, including 21 new major metropolitan areas.

For more:
- see the release
- Charlotte Business Journal has this article

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