IP Democracy: Broadband Speed War Commences

With Verizon building out fiber-to-the-premise technology across its territory, the telco has one weapon in its broadband competition arsenal that was formerly the sole tactic of cable operators: speed. The vast capacity of fiber enables Verizon to match, and beat, the traditionally faster speeds that cable can deliver, and at least one cable operator, Cablevision Systems, is responding to Verizon’s Fios high-speed service by upping its broadband throughput rates.

Fios, which Verizon is rolling out in Cablevision’s Long Island, NY backyard, sells for $49.95 for speeds of 15 Mbps download/2 Mbps upload, a far cry from the typical 1.5 Mbps download rate of ordinary DSL service. Cablevision, in response, announced today it will juice its high-speed service, offering automatic speed upgrades to all customers and extended tiers of service that deliver up to 50 Mbps download speeds.

The company said that all of its Optimum Online customers will see speed hikes from the current 10 Mbps/1Mbps to 15 Mbps/2 Mbps at no extra charge, with the speed upgrade taking place company-wide by mid-2006.

Cablevision will add a turbo-charged 30 Mbps download capacity via an upgrade it calls Optimum Online Boost, which will cost an additional $14.95 per month over the standard price of $49.95 (or $44.95 for customers who purchase Cablevision video services) or $9.95 per month more for customers who also subscribe to Cablevision’s VoIP voice service. (Verizon Fios sells a comparable 30 Mbps service for $199/month.)

Even more phenomenal, Cablevision is offering an even faster tier, Optimum Online Utra, that delivers up to 50 Mbps download speeds. The operator hasn’t yet announced pricing for this offering.

Cable has the current capacity and configuration to deliver up to 100 Mbps download rates — I’m hoping this speed war continues.

Posted by Cynthia Brumfield on November 7, 2005 9:13 PM to IP Democracy