Britt: Google Fiber an ‘Overbuilder’

Time Warner Cable chairman and CEO Glenn Britt said Google Fiber, the 1 gigabit per second fiber-optic service launched by the search giant may have some of the glow from its parent, but in the end it isn’t offering anything that the MSO hasn’t successfully competed against for decades.

“What they’re doing is not any different than an overbuilder,” Britt said. “And we’ve had overbuilders for the last several decades in the business.” Time Warner Cable chief operating officer Rob Marcus noted that Google Fiber is currently in front of about 4,000 homes in Kansas City (2,000 of which are TWC customers) and so far, defections to the service are “de minimus.” He added that TWC’s subscribers in Kansas City and Austin represent about 2.5% of TWC’s total video and high-speed Internet customers. “Despite the glow, the products are essentially the same as others are offering,” Britt said. “The speeds for the last little bit of the plant are faster, but they connect to the same old Internet where most of the servers are actually slower. Who knows what their intentions are; they have to speak for themselves. I would question the economics of this and therefore their motives, but we’ll have to see what they do.”