Uniti takes a unique, targeted market wavelength approach
Key Highlights
- Uniti’s wavelength sales to hyperscalers in Tier 2 markets contributed to a record quarter of new bookings, with over 96 400-gig waves sold to just two customers.
- The company’s focus on unique routes and recent fiber builds provide a competitive advantage, supporting its position on the Challenge Tier of the 2025 U.S. Wavelength Services leaderboard.
- Revenue from fiber infrastructure and Kinetic broadband increased, with total fiber revenue up 10% year-over-year, driven by demand from hyperscaler and neocloud customers.
- Uniti’s blended anchor lease-up cash yields reached a record 37%, reflecting cost and deployment efficiencies from previously built networks.
- The company maintains a positive outlook for 2026, with revenue projections between $3.6 billion and $3.8 billion, supported by strategic services and ongoing fiber expansion.
Keep up to date with Lightwave’s Q2 2026 earnings coverage.
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Here are other stories on Uniti:
· Uniti’s CEO wants a larger share of the optical wavelength market
· Uniti’s hyperscaler fiber service sales funnel continues to grow
· Uniti’s CEO says its hyperscaler funnel represents about $1.5B of total contract value
· Uniti wraps its Windstream merger, accelerates residential and business fiber strategy
· Uniti’s CEO says we’re in the early innings of an unprecedented fiber build
Uniti’s push to capture a larger share of the optical wavelength services pie came to fruition in the second quarter, as the service provider saw an uptick in sales to its wholesale customers.
The analyst community is taking note of its efforts. Vertical Systems Group noted its position on the Challenge Tier of its 2025 U.S. Wavelength Services LEADERBOARD.
The Challenge Tier cites providers with between 1% and 4% share of the 2025 U.S. Wavelength Services market.
Speaking to investors during its second-quarter earnings call, Kenny Gunderman, CEO of Uniti, said that building a high-capacity network in Tier 2 and 3 markets has enabled it to capture a meaningful share of new service demand, “as evidenced by a record quarter of new bookings.”
“Over 50% of the new bookings this quarter were wavelengths or lit fiber capacity as opposed to dark fiber, reinforcing the pivot from the build cycle to more lease-up and inference,” he said.
Targeted wavelength routes
While Uniti remains bullish about the wavelength opportunity, it is taking a targeted approach by focusing on routes it says are unique to Uniti and give them a competitive advantage.
Customer highlights during the quarter included two hyperscaler providers in Tier 2 markets. One data center provider purchased a 20-terabit wavelength package connecting a NeoCloud from a data center in a Tier 2 market back to a large metro.
Meanwhile, another customer purchased an 18-terabit wavelength package out of another major data center in a Tier 2 market.
“To put this in perspective, that's 96 400-gig waves sold as lease-up in one quarter to just two customers over fiber recently built into new data centers,” Gundermand said. “There's more to come, as our current waste funnel represents approximately 1.3 petabytes of traffic, and the vast majority of this funnel consists of relatively new customers.”
Record fiber bookings
Fueled by wavelengths and dark fiber, Uniti posted what it said was a record quarter of new bookings in its Fiber Infrastructure unit.
The service provider recorded consolidated bookings MRR of approximately $2.2 million, its highest level on record and an almost 30% increase from the previous record level.
“These record levels continue to be driven by the robust demand we are seeing for both dark and lit fiber solutions from hyperscaler and neocloud superscaler customers,” said Paul Bullington, CFO of Uniti.
While Uniti is building some new greenfield routes for hyperscalers, nearly 80% of its hyperscaler business includes selling all or part of its previously built network.
“Make no mistake, this is a big advantage for Uniti from a cost and time to deploy perspective, as evidenced by our blended anchor lease-up cash yields of 37%, the highest we've ever seen,” Gunderman said.
Fiber Infrastructure, Kinetic drive revenues
Driven by gains in its fiber infrastructure and its consumer Kinetic fiber broadband business, Uniti reported consolidated revenues of $909.7 million for the second quarter of 2026.
Kinetic contributed $539.0 million in revenue and $228.4 million in contribution margin for the second quarter of 2026, achieving margins of approximately 42%.
Fiber Infrastructure contributed $234.1 million in revenue and $121.8 million in contribution margin for the second quarter of 2026, achieving margins of approximately 52%. Total fiber revenue grew 10% year over year, and fiber revenue at Fiber Infrastructure grew 6%.
“At Fiber Infrastructure, we recorded consolidated bookings MRR of approximately $2.2 million, our highest level on record and an almost 30% increase from the previous record level,” said Bullington. “These record levels continue to be driven by the robust demand we are seeing for both dark and lit fiber solutions from hyperscaler and neocloud superscaler customers.”
Finally, Uniti Solutions contributed $182.5 million in revenue and $91.8 million in contribution margin for the second quarter of 2026, achieving margins of approximately 50%. Uniti Solutions’ capital expenditures during the quarter were $6.8 million.
Looking forward, Uniti is updating its 2026 outlook primarily for business unit-level revisions, the recently completed Kinetic asset securitization, and transaction-related and other costs incurred to date.
For Kinetic, Uniti maintains its revenue and contribution margin forecast to be $2.15 billion and $905 million, respectively, at the midpoint.
Uniti forecasts that Uniti Solutions’ revenues and contribution margin will be $700 million and $320 million at the midpoint. “The increase in our contribution margin guidance is due to higher margin strategic services sold during the quarter,” Bullington said.
At Fiber Infrastructure, Uniti expects revenues and contribution margin to be $1 billion and $575 million, respectively, at the midpoint for full-year 2026.
Bullington said, “The increase from our prior guidance range reflects the strong hyperscale and AI activity we saw in the second quarter.”
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About the Author
Sean BuckleySean Buckley
Sean is the Editor-in-Chief of Lightwave. He establishes and executes Lightwave's editorial strategy across its website, email newsletters, events, and other information products. Before coming to Lightwave in July 2023, he served as editor of Broadband Communities. Earlier, he served as senior editor of FierceTelecom and the editor of the former Telecommunications Magazine. He got his start in the optical industry in 1998 when he became the editor of enterprise and optical networks at Information Gatekeepers. He has a BA in English from the University of Massachusetts, Boston, and lives in Dracut, Mass, with his wife, two sons, and his cat, Dove.
