Fiber reached more than 1.4 million U.S. commercial buildings and data centers by the end of 2022, according to Vertical Systems Group’s ENS @Fiber research service. However, that number represents only about 28% of total U.S. commercial sites, according to the market research firm.
Vertical Systems Group divides the market into two main segments. The Fiber 20+ segment comprises four medium and large building sizes that house up to 251 or more employees. The Fiber <20 segment consists of small buildings with fewer than 20 employees. Not surprisingly, the larger segment is getting most of the attention from fiber connectivity providers. Fiber is available to 76.4% of sites for the Fiber 20+ segment, reports the market research firm. And 37% of commercial sites with greater than 250 employees have fiber connections from three or more providers. However, only 19.1% of sites in the Fiber <20 segment has access to fiber.
That said, the smaller buildings aren’t being ignored. “Small buildings accounted for the majority of new fiber lit sites during 2022. Suppliers include the hundreds of fiber providers across the U.S. with nationwide, regional, or metro footprints,” commented Rosemary Cochran, principal of Vertical Systems Group. “Fiber expansion continues to be boosted by multiple factors, including business demand for higher-speed network services, government funding incentives, M&A activity, joint ventures, and private investments.”
The fiber-lit buildings in the analysis include company-owned and multi-tenant commercial sites as well as data centers. The researchers define a “lit building” as having on-net fiber connectivity to a network provider’s infrastructure and active service termination equipment onsite. The counts do not include standalone cell towers, small cells not located in fiber-lit buildings, near-net buildings, buildings classified as coiled at curb or coiled in building, HFC-connected buildings, carrier central offices, residential buildings, and private or dark fiber installations.
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