Dycom: AT&T, CenturyLink’s FTTX plans are driven by customer demand, not Google Fiber

Google Fiber may have lit the fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) fire, but network construction company Dycom said that AT&T and CenturyLink’s ambitious FTTH expansion plans represent the consumer and business customer’s demand for higher speed bandwidth. Steven Nielsen, CEO of Dycom, told investors during this week’s DA Davidson 15th Annual Engineering & Construction Conference that AT&T and CenturyLink’s FTTH aren’t directly linked to Google Fiber’s actions. “Google Fiber is responding to the same factors for consumer demand for high bandwidth that the incumbents are,” Nielsen said. “They are the effect of the consumer demand and not the cause of other people spending because they are all reacting to the same environment.”

Nielsen added how a number of Canada’s key incumbent telecommunication and cable operators – a list that includes Bell, Telus, Shaw and Rogers – all stated they will enhance their fiber and broadband footprints. “In Canada where Google Fiber is not present, you have the exact same dynamic as you have here in the U.S.,” Nielsen said. AT&T and CenturyLink have set some ambitious targets for their FTTH deployments, a process that will represent potential new revenue streams for Dycom. During the second quarter, AT&T had only 2.2 million homes passed with fiber, a figure the telecommunication company expects to ramp to 2.6 million by the end of 2016.