Days Numbered for DSL
Verizon Adding More FiOS Internet Subscribers than DSL Customers
By Tom Steinert-Threlkeld -- Multichannel News, July 31, 2007
Monterey, Calif. -- The days of digital subscriber line appear to be numbered, and that number is not big.
“The bottom is kind of coming out of that marketplace,” said Matt Stump, vice president of One Touch Intelligence, a market-research firm based in Denver.
On Monday, the nation’s second-largest telephone company, Verizon Communications, announced a huge drop in the growth of its DSL business, which provides high-speed-Internet access over copper telephone wires.
In its second quarter, Verizon added 85,000 subscribers, according to Investor’s Business Daily.
That compares to 329,000 DSL subscribers that it added in the same quarter a year ago.
And, for the first time, Stump noted at The Independent Show here, Verizon added more high-speed customers through its FiOS Internet product. That broadband service is provided over a new set of communications lines the telco is laying directly to customers’ homes that are glass fibers and carry signals as bursts of light.
Even though only a small portion of Verizon customers can now get FiOS services, the company added 203,000 FiOS Internet customers in the second quarter. All told, the company now has 1 million FiOS Internet subscribers.
Verizon is spending $18 billion through 2010 to bring FiOS past about 18 million homes.
Stump suggested to independent cable operators that they hunt for broadband customers in areas where Verizon was not building out its FiOS network.
Operators could even present themselves at potential customers’ doors as the phone company.
That’s what one independent operator said Tuesday that it was doing -- and with greater success than when its sales representatives were identifying themselves as the cable company in door-to-door calls.
“Our pitch is, we’re the new phone company in town,” said Kyle Alcorn, vice president of marketing for NewWave Communications in Sikeston, Mo.
The switch to identifying itself as a phone company came last month, Alcorn said, and it has resulted in roughly 25%-35% more doors opening up for sales presentations.
The close rate remains about 25%. But with more doors opening up, the company now gets business form 20-30 out of every 100 households it’s trying to sell to, up from 15-20.
New Wave serves about 105,000 subscribers in Kentucky, Illinois, Tennessee, Missouri and Arkansas.
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