In U.S. Market, Cable Broadband Increasingly is Preferred to Telco Broadbvand

In 2006, U.S. telcos as a whole were adding more high-speed access customers than U.S. cable companies. Since 2008, cable companies have been adding more high-speed access customers than telcos, with the gap really opening by 2010.


During the second quarter of 2012, cable companies took a 140 percent share of broadband flow during the quarter, according to UBS Research telecom analyst John Hodulik notes.


Given the commanding telco ownership of the strategic wireless business, the continued slow decline of the telco consumer voice business, again largely to the benefit of cable operators, plus the heightened importance of the business customer segment, all might suggest that the tier-one U.S. telcos quietly have decided to focus their efforts on wireless services, with fixed network attention increasingly focused on business customer accounts. 


Some of us would say, in fact, that the U.S. leaders in consumer local access, in the future, might be the cable providers, while the telcos remain dominant in wireless and business services. 


That isn't to say that telcos can afford to give up on fixed network consumer accounts; simply that the approach has to be "mobile first," "business second." In the consumer segment, telcos will basically try to stay "close enough," without real expectations of sustaining market leadership in consumer services. 


That will be a huge change in U.S. communications industry dynamics, but it is hard to predict any other outcome, extrapolating from current trends.