Over 7 million cable and fiber locations
Astound is already the product of industry consolidation through a series of private equity deals that combined Wave Broadband, RCN and Grande Communications. A research note from the New Street analyst firm said GFiber serves 2.8 million locations in 15 states, while Astound’s service area covers 4.45 million locations in 12 states and the District of Columbia. Most of Astound’s network is cable broadband, but it has 892,014 fiber locations and 44,548 copper locations.
“Put together, both companies outperformed by ~7.1 [million] Locations in 26 states,” the research note said. ”The two companies overlap in only three counties (109k locations) in Texas. The combined entity will have the largest footprint in Texas and Illinois. Cable and fiber will cover approximately equal shares of locations for the combined company.”
The combined GFiber/Astound company will face competition from at least one cable or fiber/copper provider in most of its territory. This includes AT&T at 53 percent of locations, Comcast at 46 percent of locations, Charter at 43 percent of locations, Verizon at 22 percent of locations, and Lumen (CenturyLink) at 11 percent of locations.
New Street said there are some unanswered questions, such as whether the combined company will continue to expand into areas served by existing cable and fiber operators, and whether it will upgrade its own cable footprint with fiber.
GFiber provides service in Texas, North Carolina, Missouri, Utah, Kansas, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia, Iowa, California, Arizona, Nebraska, Idaho, Colorado, and South Carolina. Astound is in Illinois, Texas, New York, California, Washington, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, District of Columbia, Oregon, Maryland, Indiana, Virginia and New Jersey.
About 78 percent of GFiber’s locations are in Texas, North Carolina, Missouri, Utah and Kansas, according to New Street data. Illinois, Texas, New York, California and Washington combined account for about 72 percent of Astound’s locations.
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