Verizon accelerates fiber build via Eaton Fiber’s $1.5B Ripple Fiber deal
Key Highlights
- Verizon’s partnership with Eaton Fiber and Ripple Fiber aims to extend fiber broadband to over a million new locations outside its current footprint.
- The acquisition supports Verizon’s goal to pass up to 50 million homes by 2026, including a focus on multi-dwelling units and new market penetration.
- Industry trends indicate accelerated fiber consolidation, with over 400 small providers ripe for mergers, driven by demand for high-capacity networks and convergence of wireless and wireline services.
- Verizon’s strategic investments and acquisitions are part of a broader industry shift towards integrated broadband and wireless offerings to enhance customer retention and ARPU.
- The fiber market is experiencing rapid consolidation, with major players leveraging capital-efficient platforms to address the growing demand for high-speed connectivity and AI workloads.
Verizon made yet another move to enhance its out-of-territory fiber expansion effort as its partner, Eaton Fiber, secured a $1.5 billion investment from Bain Capital and Tillman Global Holdings, which includes the acquisition of competitive fiber provider Ripple Fiber.
As a first step in its buy-and-build strategy, supported by the acquisition of Ripple Fiber, Eaton Fiber will bring Verizon fiber broadband to over a million locations outside its current fiber footprint.
Ripple Fiber's existing shareholders, Platform Investment Partners and KLT, will continue to back the Eaton Fiber platform alongside Tillman and Bain Capital.
To meet its fiber expansion goals, particularly in markets outside of its traditional fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) footprint, the service provider is considering potential acquisitions and partnerships.
Last October, Verizon inked a deal with Eaton Fiber, an affiliate of Tillman Global Holdings, to target serviceable addresses in new markets.
Dan Schulman, Verizon CEO, said that its ongoing fiber build is a key element of its “convergence strategy, and this partnership gives us a highly capital-efficient model to extend Verizon’s fiber broadband experience to more customers outside of our core footprint.”
Out-of-territory expansion
Verizon’s latest agreement with Eaton to acquire Ripple Fiber is part of an aggressive strategy to expand its fiber broadband reach through a mix of organic builds, targeted acquisitions and partnerships.
A key element of the Ripple acquisition is Verizon's plan to expand its fiber reach outside its traditional wireline territory.
Eaton Fiber will fund and build the network and be responsible for network maintenance and installation. Verizon will be responsible for sales and marketing and end-user customer service.
The service provider’s agreement with Eaton complements its acquisition of Frontier. With Frontier in its pocket, Verizon has raised the number of homes it plans to pass with fiber to 35 million to 40 million to 40 to 50 million.
But the Eaton agreement isn’t just about single-family home penetration, but also a way to further penetrate the competitive multi-dwelling unit (MDU) broadband market. Verizon’s Schulman noted in its fourth-quarter earnings call that “Tillman is going to help us with multi-dwelling units (MDUs) as we pass those locations.”
Schulman reinforced that its efforts to grow homes passed during its second-quarter earnings call. “As I mentioned on our last earnings call, you're going to continue to see a mix shift towards fiber,” he said. “We're growing our homes passed. We've got line of sight to at least 32 million homes passed by the end of the year.”
As part of the deal, Verizon will acquire Ripple Fiber's existing customers, who will transition to Verizon’s fiber broadband platform over time following closing, with uninterrupted service throughout the transition. Verizon will also acquire a small portion of Ripple Fiber's network and related assets adjacent to or partially within Verizon's existing fiber footprint in North Carolina and South Carolina.
After meeting customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals, the Ripple acquisition is set to close before the end of 2026. Ripple itself has been aggressively building out fiber across multiple territories, establishing a presence in 10 states. Earlier this month, Ripple
“The acquisition of Ripple Fiber meaningfully strengthens Eaton Fiber’s relationship with Verizon, while the partnership and long-term capital from Bain Capital provide additional resources to accelerate its fiber deployment,” said Sachit Ahuja, Co-President of Tillman and Co-Founder of Eaton Fiber. “Together, these steps position Eaton Fiber to further enhance its strong build momentum and expand its geographic reach.”
Verizon isn’t alone in its desire to expand its fiber territory outside of its traditional wireline territory. Fellow ILEC AT&T has been making similar moves through its acquisition of Lumen’s fiber assets and its Gigapower open access platform.
But the deals being made by Verizon and AT&T aren’t just about fiber expansion. They are about creating a broader platform to sell converged wireless and wireline services.
AT&T, which is in the process of completing its acquisition of Lumen’s consumer fiber assets, noted in its fourth-quarter earnings call that it expects the convergence rate to reach 50%, driven by fiber and wireless integration, as part of a broader industry realignment towards bundled services. Verizon and AT&T’s emphasis on convergence comes as their cable competitors continue to raise the stakes by growing their wireless bases and bundling services.
Of note, Comcast and Charter both saw their wireless subscriber bases grow in the second quarter amid ongoing broadband losses. Comcast reported it added 448,000 new customers, marking the best quarter on record. Likewise, Charter reported it added 406,000 mobile lines during the quarter, bringing the total to 12.5 million lines.
“Fixed Mobile Convergence has crossed the threshold from strategy to competitive imperative,” said PWC in its Telecommunications: US Deals 2026 midyear outlook. “The ability to offer customers both home broadband and mobile service is a primary driver of customer retention, ARPU expansion, and M&A rationale.”
Fiber broadband consolidation accelerates
Verizon’s acquisition of Ripple via its partner Eaton reflects the ongoing and inevitable consolidation of the fiber broadband market. Industry experts note that this will accelerate over the remainder of 2026 and beyond.
PWC noted that the telecommunications industry entered 2026 with renewed M&A momentum, driven by three main trends: an accelerating wave of fiber operator consolidation, fixed and mobile broadband convergence, and the growing demand for high-capacity networks to support AI workloads.
“Fiber consolidation is underway and accelerating,” PWC said. “Hundreds of geographically specific fiber operators exist across the United States, and the economics of fragmentation have become untenable.”
A similar survey conducted by AlixPartners found that more than 400 small fiber providers in the U.S. “are ripe for picking by investors or larger fiber companies when the inevitable major fiber consolidation wave occurs.”
Alix Partners estimates that there are about 1,900 small-scale fiber companies in the U.S., about 1,000 of which are either electric co-ops or linked to more prominent energy players. AlixPartners estimates that roughly 400 of the remaining 900 small-scale fiber companies are meaningful candidates for mergers and acquisitions.
Angelo Rufino, Head of North America Special Situations and Head of Corporate Special Situations in Europe at Bain Capital, said that the U.S. fiber market is at what he calls “a critical inflection point,” which is making it challenging for a large range of independent fiber broadband providers to exist.
“Higher interest rates and tighter capital markets have constrained supply for standalone fiber-to-the-premise platforms, even as demand for high-quality broadband continues to grow,” he said. “Wholesale fiber platforms have emerged as the most capital-efficient way to close that gap at scale.”
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Service provider fiber broadband deals (2024-2026)
|
Service provider |
Acquisition |
Deal amount |
|
AT&T |
$5.75 billion |
|
|
Verizon |
$20 billion |
|
|
Verizon |
$1.5 billion |
|
|
T-Mobile |
$4.9 billion |
|
|
Bell Canada |
$3.65 billion |
|
|
Digital Bridge |
Wide Open West |
$1.5 billion |
|
T-Mobile |
$1.45 billion |
|
|
T-Mobile |
GoNetspeed, Greenlight Networks |
$2 billion |
|
T-Mobile |
i3 Broadband |
$700 million |
|
Cable One |
Vyve Broadband |
$475 million |
|
Shentel |
$385 million |
|
|
Shentel |
WideOpen Blacksburg Network |
(Not disclosed) |
|
GFiber and Stonepeak |
Astound Broadband |
(Not disclosed) |
|
IQ Fiber |
ThinkBig Networks |
(Not disclosed) |
|
Greenlight Networks |
Loop Internet |
(Not disclosed) |
|
Greenlight Networks |
FastBridge Fiber |
(Not disclosed) |
|
Intrepid Fiber Networks |
(Not disclosed) |
|
|
TDS Telecom |
Granite State Networks |
(Not disclosed) |
|
Ezee Fiber |
(Not disclosed) |
About the Author
Sean Buckley
Sean is responsible for establishing and executing the editorial strategy of Lightwave across its website, email newsletters, events, and other information products.
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