(Allison Joyce/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
To expand in the home internet market, T-Mobile is preparing to deploy fiber to 12 million to 15 million homes in the US by 2030.
Although the carrier isn’t known for supplying high-speed fiber internet, T-Mobile has been gearing up for a larger presence in the market. Earlier this year, the company entered into joint ventures to acquire Lumos and Metronet, two fiber-to-the-home providers.
At an investors event on Wednesday, T-Mobile CEO Mike Sievert revealed the 12 to 15 million goal as part of the carrier’s push to drive more financial growth. This comes as T-Mobile Fiber is already available in cities across at least eight US states, offering 1gig and 2gig speeds, starting at $75 and $110 per month.
(Credit: T-Mobile)The fiber expansion is designed to complement T-Mobile's 5G Home Internet service, which has grown to 5.6 million customers. The service works by using the carrier’s excess capacity on its cellular networks to deliver download rates up to 245Mbps to home internet users.
The problem is that T-Mobile only has limited capacity to serve customers in each neighborhood through the 5G Home Internet business. As a result, the carrier has over a million customers on a waitlist for the service.
In response, T-Mobile views its emerging fiber business as a way to address the waitlist. The fiber service also offers an upgrade path for subscribers already on to its 5G Home Internet service, reducing the capacity load, thereby allowing waitlisted customers to sign up.
At the same event, Sievert said T-Mobile is aiming to grow the 5G Home Internet service to 12 million customers by 2028, up from the goal of hitting 7 to 8 million by next year.
T-Mobile previously said Lumos currently reaches 320,000 homes while Metronet reaches more than 2 million homes. But together, both are slated to reach at least 10 million households by 2030, according to the company’s past statements.