Fiber-to-the-home leaders and innovators for 2021 A BBC Staff Report uilding a Fiber-Connected World” and latency. For service providers, FTTH has is the tagline of BROADBAND the advantage of lowering operational costs and “BCOMMUNITIES magazine, and decreasing churn. each year the Fiber-To-The-Home Top 100 list Service providers of all sizes are taking recognizes organizations that lead the way in advantage of the FTTH opportunity, going all this endeavor. in. The three largest telcos – AT&T, Verizon Fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) deployment in and Quantum Fiber (formerly CenturyLink) – the U.S. is beginning to outpace legacy copper are expanding their FTTH footprints. broadband, a trend impacting service providers AT&T aims to more than double its fiber and their vendor suppliers. footprint in the coming years to reach 30 RVA LLC’s 2021 North American FTTH million customer locations by the end of 2025. forecast predicts U.S. FTTH investment of more Quantum Fiber exited the first quarter with than $60 billion in the next five years. A large about 2.5 million homes enabled with fiber and portion will be used to make fiber available to 715,000 broadband customers on fiber. new homes for the first time, but some will be Smaller telcos, such as Consolidated allocated to create fiber competition for homes Communications, Lumos Networks/ that already have a fiber provider. NorthState and Smithville, are no less RVA said this latest FTTH investment aggressive with FTTH. After securing a $425 cycle is driven by several factors: providing the million investment from Searchlight Capital best consumer user experience versus other Partners, Consolidated is enhancing its fiber broadband delivery methods such as cable coax, infrastructure. It also has been actively pursuing telecom DSL, wireless or satellite in terms of public-private partnerships with several towns reliability; speed (upstream and downstream); in Maine and New Hampshire to build out FTTH services. Lumos Networks/NorthState, which leverages the financial backing of its parent, EQT, set a goal to connect thousands of new homes and businesses. Meanwhile, ORGANIZATIONS ADDED OR *REINSTATED TO Smithville is expanding FTTH organically and THE FTTH TOP 100 LIST IN 2021 has struck partnerships with various electric cooperatives, including the Utilities District *DZS www.dzsi.com of Western Indiana REMC (UDWI) and SCI Greenlight Networks www.greenlightnetworks.com REMC, an Indiana rural electric cooperative. LUS Fiber www.lusfiber.com Outside the domain of incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs), cable operators and 36 | BROADBAND COMMUNITIES | www.broadbandcommunities.com | JULY 2021 TOP 100 AT A GLANCE Network Planning, Systems Integration, Design, Engineering, Construction, Installation.................| 49 rapidly expand across the west side of Fiber and Fiber Cable ............................................... | 51 the Genesee River market and expand Network Testing, Monitoring and Management Services . | 53 its workforce. Network Management Solutions ...................................| 58 Like other regional electric utilities, Fiber-to-the-Home Electronics .....................................| 63 Lafayette Utilities System (LUS, the Test and Measurement Equipment .................................| 65 municipally owned utilities company in Optical LAN Solutions...............................................| 73 Lafayette, Louisiana) chose to upgrade Distributors of Fiber Optic Products ................................ | 76 the outdated microwave system for Network Planning and Design Solutions............................| 79 connecting its substations with fiber. Passive Components for FTTH Networks . | 81 Later, LUS Fiber became one of the Network Deployers and Service Providers..........................| 83 first municipally owned companies to FTTH Construction Equipment......................................| 87 provide FTTH services in the state of Louisiana, and one of the first municipally owned FTTH companies in the country. It offers broadband speeds ranging from 3 Mbps to 10 competitors also are making progress. ecosystem. Optical fiber and fiber cables; Gbps and phone and video services. Cable multiple-system operator Altice passive equipment for connecting, Rejoining the list this year is DZS. USA has a plan to extend fiber to protecting and managing fiber; and Formerly known as DASAN-Zhone, 500,000 homes this year. Meanwhile, active equipment for sending and DZS is repositioning its presence in Charter Communications, one of the receiving signals over fiber are the most the U.S. After naming telecom veteran big winners in the FCC’s Rural Digital basic components of an FTTH network, Charlie Vogt as CEO, DZS has been Opportunity Fund (RDOF) auction, along with software for planning, setting expanding its broadband and optical will bring FTTH to rural communities. up and managing networks and for portfolio via acquisitions of other As more providers expand their provisioning and billing fiber services. FTTH footprints, they are adopting vendors, such as Optelian. The list contains many companies that XGS-PON, a technology to offer Besides the new entrants, a handful design, manufacture and distribute these symmetrical 10 Gbps FTTH services. of companies either have changed Research firm Dell’Oro Group noted essential products. names or were acquired. BHC Rhodes that total global revenue for the To put these pieces together requires is now BHC. In September 2020, broadband access equipment market firms that finance, plan, design, CenturyLink rebranded under three rose $3.3 billion in the first quarter engineer, construct and install fiber separate entities: Lumen Technologies, of 2021, up 18 percent year-over-year. optic networks, as well as those that CenturyLink and Quantum Fiber. Growth came from spending on PON make equipment for digging, pushing, (CenturyLink is the legacy telecom OLT ports, particularly 10 Gbps pulling and attaching fiber. These, business and Quantum Fiber PON technologies. too, are represented on the list. Also delivers fiber internet to residents Industry research firm Broadband included are several organizations that and small businesses. Lumen will Trends reports that in addition to advocate for better broadband. provide enterprise business services.) offering symmetrical services, service Finally, there would not be any fiber Meanwhile, the law firm Baller, Stokes providers can offer an array of business/ to the home if not for the deployers & Lide became Keller and Heckman enterprise services and provide – large and small, private and public, and OSPInsight was folded into the connectivity for key applications, incumbent and competitive – that invest geospatial software company IQGeo such as remote education, telehealth in FTTH networks. following acquisitions. and teleworking. What’s more, 10G Companies newly added or symmetrical fiber networks can be used reinstated to the list represent a variety SELECTION CRITERIA for mobile backhaul/fronthaul and the of ecosystem niches. In selecting the FTTH Top 100, aggregation of remote access node traffic the editors looked for organizations in support of accelerating 5G mobile Two of the new entrants, Greenlight Networks and LUS Fiber, are emerging that advance the cause of fiber-based service deployments. broadband by It’s no wonder the industry regional FTTH competitive players. is expanding and the number of Founded in 2011, Greenlight Networks • Deploying networks that are large companies competing for the Top 100 began offering 1 Gbps FTTH internet or ambitious, have innovative slots continues to grow. That’s great for service in 2012 in the Rochester area business plans, or are intended the country, even if it makes life difficult of New York state. After the company to transform local economies or for the editors who assemble this list. was purchased by local billionaire improve communities’ quality of life The 2021 FTTH Top 100 list businessman and philanthropist Tom • Supplying key hardware, software represents the whole fiber-to-the-home Golisano in 2018, Greenlight began to or services to deployers JULY 2021 | www.broadbandcommunities.com | BROADBAND COMMUNITIES | 37 FIBER-TO-THE-HOME TOP 100 LIST • Introducing innovative technologies to organizations that serve national represents only a small part of their with game-changing potential, rather than local markets. Overall size business. In making these selections, even if they have not yet been is unimportant, as is corporate form – the editors considered how important commercially deployed in addition to for-profit companies, the the organizations are to advancing fiber • Providing key conditions for fiber list includes municipalities, a telephone broadband rather than how important builds, such as advocacy or demand cooperative, an electric cooperative and fiber broadband is to them. aggregation a nonprofit research organization. To be listed among the FTTH Top Although some organizations The FTTH Top 100 list was researched 100, an organization may be based on the list focus entirely on fiber to by Marianne Cotter, Rachel Ellner and anywhere in the world but must do the premises (FTTP) or other fiber- Kassandra Kania and overseen by editor- business in North America. Except for based broadband technologies, most in-chief Sean Buckley. To nominate a broadband service providers, which deliver or support a mix of broadband company for next year’s FTTH Top 100, inherently are local, we give preference technologies. For some, broadband