Nobody Overbuilds Fiber

Ten years ago, I routinely told clients that nobody builds fiber to overbuild an established fiber network. And at the time it was true except for a few well-known examples. For example, when Google Fiber went to neighborhoods in the Research Triangle in North Carolina and in Austin, Texas, both the incumbent telephone company and cable company both reacted by building fiber. I know a few folks that live in those areas today, and they have the choice of three fiber providers. Apparently, a lot of fiber overbuilders are now overbuilding existing fiber networks. There were 2 million fiber passings built in 2023 that are competing with another fiber provider. It’s clearly no longer true that nobody overbuilds fiber, but I still have a hard time promoting the idea.