US Places Fourth Globally For Ultra High-Speed Internet Connections

The United States is behind three Asian nations when it comes to the deployment of ultra high-speed Internet networks, according to a recent report from a British broadband data analysis firm Point Topic.

The U.S. had paltry 6.9 million subscribers to fiber-to-the-home broadband service in the first quarter of 2011, compared to 28.9 million in China, 20.14 million in Japan, and 9.5 million in South Korea, according to Point Topic's global broadband deployment report, which gathers data from both commercial and government sources. The 6.9 million subscriber number in the United States represents nine percent of the total broadband market, with cable and DSL subscribers making up the rest of the wireline broadband market. That penetration percentage is markedly below those of the other Asian nations. Thirty-eight percent of China's broadband subscribers used fiber-to-the-home in the first quarter of 2011, compared to about 26 percent for Japan, and 12.46 percent for South Korea. Overall, China leads the world in terms of the number of broadband subscribers with 135.23 million subscribers; the U.S. has 88.7 million, Japan has 34.6 million and Germany has 27.16 million.

The most noteworthy number is the fiber-to-the-home number, however, since that's the technology that the experts pinpoint as being the most durable and cost-effective form of information infrastructure that many policymakers think is important to keeping nations competitive.