No matter your opinion about how many Mbps a residential broadband subscriber actually needs, it’s impossible to deny that service providers are continuing to up the speed ante to attract and maintain subscribers no matter the speeds they really use.
As promised earlier this month, Verizon has launched its Fios Instant Internet service with equal upload and download speeds of 750 Mbps in Boston and Norfolk, Va., the company announced on Wednesday. Back on Jan. 14, the Fios 750/750 Mbps symmetrical speeds were made available to nearly seven million homes and businesses in New York City/northern New Jersey, Philadelphia, and Richmond, Va.
“No internet service provider has come close to offering upload and download speeds like these at such a massive scale as Fios Instant Internet,” Ken Dixon, president of Verizon’s consumer landline business, says. “Ever since we decided to build the nation’s largest 100 percent fiber-to-the-home network 14 years ago, we’ve been saying that it is a future-proof technology. The future is now here with Fios Instant Internet.”
Future-proofing is obviously part of the Fios strategy here, as it is for any operator deploying advanced speed offerings. While some research indicates the average U.S. home had approximately seven or eight connected devices in 2016, Verizon posted a YouTube video showing how its Instant Internet service worked in a Manhattan apartment it outfitted with close to 100 devices.
