RVA: FTTH passes 18.2 million N.A. homes

Fiber-to-the-home infrastructure now passes more than 18.2 million North American homes, and more than 5.8 million of those are actually connected to FTTH service, according to research commissioned by the FTTH Council and conducted by RVA Market Research and Consulting. Those figures are up about 3 million and 1.4 million, respectively, from numbers reported by RVA at this time last year.

However, with Verizon, the U.S. market leader with 4.3 million FTTH connections as March 30, saying recently that it is done entering new markets with FTTH, there appears good reason to believe the homes passed number will not continue the explosive growth rates it regularly posted during the last decade. RVA noted that growth is likely to “slow somewhat in the next couple of years before turning upward again.”

RVA says in its “Fiber to the Home: North American Market Update,” an annually-revised report showcased by the FTTH Council every spring, that there are actually more than 750 smaller telcos currently deploying or planning to deploy the technology. RVA also tracked the likelihood of “non-RBOC ILECs” to deploy FTTH in the future, with more than 72% of companies that have deployed some FTTH in the past saying they are “very likely” to do more in the future, and more than 65% of those who have never deployed FTTH saying they are “very likely” to start.

Broadband stimulus might help future FTTH penetration among these smaller companies. Though along with recession caution, it could have been one of the factors that kept them on the sidelines last year, RVA noted, as several providers were believed to have halted planned projects in order to wait and find out if they qualified for stimulus money.