Charter sees potential in providing wholesale fiber connectivity to data centers
Key Highlights
- Charter plans to leverage Cox’s assets to enhance its wholesale data center and fiber connectivity offerings.
- The merger will expand fiber and Ethernet capabilities, potentially reshuffling industry rankings by 2026.
- Charter is focusing on medium and large business growth, with increased revenue from these segments.
- Strategic partnerships with Verizon and T-Mobile bolster Charter’s wireless and business service portfolio.
- The combined entity aims to compete aggressively against Tier 1 and regional providers in wholesale markets.
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Here are other stories on Charter:
· Charter and Cox $34B merger creates a broadband and business service powerhouse
· Charter, Verizon and Zayo acquisitions to shake up 2026 Ethernet rankings
· Charter’s CEO says T-Mobile partnership opens the door for business wireless sales
Charter Communications may be a strong player in the consumer and business services market, leading the broadband market in subscribers and even gaining greater footing in medium and large businesses. Still, the cable MSO sees data centers as a key wholesale prospect.
While Charter has found success in providing fiber and other high-speed circuits for wireless backhaul, it could leverage Cox’s assets and experience, including the Segra assets, to strengthen its position in providing wholesale services for data centers.
Christopher Winfrey, CEO of Charter, while not revealing any specific data center wholesale plans, cited Cox’s capabilities as a weapon it could use to gain share in a market where it will face off against not only Tier 1 competitors Verizon and Lumen, but aggressive regional players like Lightpath and FiberLight.
“You can talk about the data center business that exists today for fiber connectivity,” he said. “And I think Cox has done a really good job of being aggressive in getting after that. And because we're so retail focused, I think we're getting into it now, and we'll have a great opportunity. But maybe we didn't focus on it as much as we should have.”
Cox has had plenty of experience in the wholesale market. Starting in the early 1990s, Cox started offering business services. Later, in 2010, the cable MSO built out its carrier and wholesale division, scaling its fiber backbone to provide backhaul, transport, and broadband services to tier-1 wireless and wireline carriers.
Charter and Cox have also consistently been ranked high on Vertical Systems Group’s On-Net Fiber and U.S. Carrier Ethernet LEADERBOARDs. As a combined company, it will have an even greater reach of fiber and Ethernet capabilities.
Rick Malone, principal of Vertical Systems Group, said in its the U.S. Ethernet Leaderboard remained unchanged through 2025, “we expect major reshuffling in 2026,” said “top provider rankings will shake up this year due in part to Verizon’s now-completed acquisition of Frontier, Zayo’s impending acquisition of Crown Castle’s fiber business, and by mid-2026, Charter is expected to complete its Charter is expected to complete its acquisition of Cox.”
The wireless factor
Charter's response to the business customer’s growing reliance on mobile communications continues to bear fruit.
During the second quarter of 2026, Charter added 406,000 total mobile lines, compared to growth of 491,000 during the second quarter of 2025.
Second quarter mobile service revenue totaled $1.1 billion, an increase of 18.9% year-over-year, driven by mobile line growth and rate adjustments.
After establishing a strong foothold in the consumer wireless market via an agreement with Verizon, Charter also established an MVNO agreement with T-Mobile for its business customers last year.
Through its relationship with T-Mobile, which allows it to use the wireless operator's 5G network, Charter started delivering mobile services to business customers earlier this year.
Charter’s wireless partnership leverages T-Mobile's mobile network through a long-term Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO) relationship. The MVNO will expand Charter’s ability to deliver wireline and wireless offerings. Mobile services will be offered by Charter under the Spectrum Mobile for Business brand.
“We have great partners, Verizon, now principally on the residential side, who's been a great partner, a great network,” Winfrey said. “And we've recently launched on the B2B side, incrementally going forward with T-Mobile, also obviously a fantastic network, and a capital-light approach for us that makes a lot of sense.”
Medium, large businesses drive revenues
Like its cable counterparts Comcast and Cox Business, Charter’s Spectrum Business unit is seeing the bulk of its growth coming from medium and large business customers.
This was evident in the cable MSO’s second-quarter results as total commercial revenue grew by 1.5% year-over-year, with mid-market and large business revenue growth of 2.8%.
Excluding all wholesale revenue, mid-market and large business revenue grew by 3.5%.
Small business revenue grew by 0.7%.
Jessica Fischer, CFO of Charter, said the SMB results “reflect year-over-year growth in revenue per small business customer of 1.5%, partly offset by a year-over-year decline in small business customers of 0.8%.”
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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.
