Google Fiber eyes expansion into five US states

Google Fiber – The ISP spin off of the Silicon Valley giant – is planning to expand its FTTH network into Arizona, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada and Idaho.

Google Fiber, who you don’t hear an awful lot out of it has to be said, has declared it is planning a big expansion to multiple cities across five US states – Arizona, Colorado, Nebraska, Nevada and Idaho. The firm announced today via a corporate blog that it is in the process of talking to various city leaders with regards to rolling out its FTTH products into those regions.

These states will be the main focus of the firm’s growth ‘for the next several years’, along with continued expansion into metro areas it already reaches. It is also apparently looking to speak to ‘communities that want to build their own fibre networks’, in order to replicate projects such as those it has previously deployed in Huntsville and West Des Moines.

“We’re thrilled to be expanding our geographic reach once again — bringing better internet to more people in more places,” said Dinni Jain, CEO of Google Fiber. “Stay tuned in the coming months as we fill in this picture with more details about our new cities, even faster speeds and redefined customer service.”

We’re told Google Fiber has been steadily building out its network in places like North Carolina and Utah. A recent expansion into West Des Moines made Iowa its first new state in five years, and it’s about to start construction in neighbouring Des Moines.

“And that’s just the stuff we’ve been talking about,” said Jain. “For the past several years, we’ve been even busier behind the scenes, focusing on our vision of providing the best possible gigabit internet service to our customers through relentless refinements to our service delivery and products. At no time in Google Fiber’s history has that ever been more important than today. We’re living in a world that has finally caught up to the idea that high-speed, reliable internet — at gigabit speeds — is no longer a bold idea or a “nice to have.” The experience of the last couple of years has certainly taught us that.”

It’s sounds like while for whatever reason Google Fiber hasn’t exactly been going at break neck speeds in terms of its expansions across the US in recent years, it is certainly planning some hefty land grabs now. The blog promises more details in due course, but perhaps the firm is looking to surf a rising wave of demand (as well as investment cash) for fibre connections that we have seen across the globe recently, spurred on in no small part by covid lockdowns and a shift in the culture towards working from home.

Get the latest news straight to your inbox. Register for the Telecoms.com newsletter here.