Wireless Phone Giants Are Stealing Internet Customers From Cable

A new generation of high-speed radio frequencies is allowing phone companies to grab a larger share of home internet subscriptions from cable TV operators. Of the 3.7 million new broadband customers signed up by the five biggest cable and telephone companies last year, 22 percent went to wireless connections, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. T-Mobile and Verizon grabbed 819,000 subscribers, a significant bite out of the broadband market. Their weapon, new fixed wireless connections to the home using 5G frequencies. AT&T doesn’t break out its wireless internet customer numbers and its business is still small. Comcast and Charter Communications, on the other hand, saw the number of new broadband subscribers they signed up fall by 40 percent. While the slowdown was expected, given the surge of people who geared up their home networks to ride out the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the tallies from the cable giants were lower than Wall Street expected.