Verizon Shows The Limits of Fiber

[Commentary] Whenever the talk of a competitive high-speed Internet market comes up, defenders of the Bells are quick to point to fiber deployment as the great savior. Now it's clear that fiber deployments will be much more limited than previously thought. The debate should end about fiber being a ubiquitous, robust competitor in the market. The nonsense about "platform competition," with fiber as the poster child, is over. As part of its strategy to concentrate on wireless, and, for the lucky ones, fiber-based FIOS, Verizon is prepared to leave 10 million customers it currently serves out in the non-fiber cold. By the end of 2010, when the company's fiber build-out will largely be complete, about 17 million homes will have FIOS, Verizon Exec. Vice President John Killian said on an analyst call Wednesday. With the fire sale to Frontier, Verizon will be left with about 27 million lines, give or take. That's not the end of the story. Verizon is cutting loose another 750,000 customers who Killian said would have been eligible to receive FIOS, but are now part of the Frontier transaction. If nothing else, this deal opens the way for more acceptance of alternative fiber providers to step up, particularly in the soon-to-be former Verizon territories now being cut loose. The argument against municipalities and others getting into the business as competitors to the phone company creeps quietly away as the phone company abdicates.