- Gigapower expects to announce a new ISP on its network soon, said revenue chief Jeff Seidenfaden
- It’s still working to reach 1.5M U.S. fiber locations
- Seidenfaden said Gigapower is striving for a “complementary” open access strategy
Gigapower is prepping for the next step in its open access growth plan. Since AT&T and BlackRock’s joint venture kicked off in May 2023, AT&T has been Gigapower’s first – and only – tenant. But that’s about to change, Gigapower Chief Revenue Officer Jeff Seidenfaden told Fierce in an interview.
Without naming any names, he said, “we are currently engaging with multiple ISPs to be part of our network in some way. It is likely that we will have another ISP that will be offering service on the network within the next 30 days.”
Meaning Gigapower is inching closer to running a bona fide open access fiber network, where various providers can ride on a single, shared infrastructure. The update comes after Gigapower announced it completed network construction across six states: Florida, New Mexico, northeastern Pennsylvania, North Carolina, South Carolina and southeastern Minnesota.
All told, Gigapower now offers service to “just under 70 communities,” Seidenfaden said, as it continues to work on reaching 1.5 million fiber locations. He declined to share Gigapower’s current passings number but noted the operator is still on target to finish most of its build by 2027.
To more effectively reach the 1.5 million passings target, Gigapower typically goes after underserved markets “that have some size to them,” i.e., areas that aren’t rural, he said. Competition includes incumbent cable companies and other fiber providers racing to grow their footprints.
Gigapower seems to be gaining traction, despite analyst concerns. AT&T previously hadn’t delved too much into how Gigapower is progressing, leading New Street Research to suspect the JV has “fallen short of expectations so far.”
While AT&T and BlackRock founded the venture, Seidenfaden stressed Gigapower is in the driver’s seat of its growth strategy. The operator is “an independently-run organization with our own executive leadership team,” he said. “From an ownership perspective, there’s obviously feedback on what returns may look like based on community builds.”
Gigapower’s open access strategy
As Gigapower looks for more ISPs to join its ranks, Seidenfaden believes operators on an open access network should strive to be “complementary” — for example, a wireless provider that sells fiber service or a “video-forward” company that offers broadband.
“It won’t be just a library of ISPs that are on the Gigapower network that become confusing to the end consumer,” he said.
Essentially, Gigapower is “looking for those that offer consumer choice, not just in a brand but in something that’s meaningful to them about what they want to use in their home.”
Given open access networks aren’t as widespread in the U.S. as they are in Europe and other parts of the world, “it has taken time, I think even inside the industry, to really fully grasp what the concept of open access is,” Seidenfaden noted.
But he doesn’t think there’s really a challenge in explaining what open access is to consumers. They may not even realize they’re using a service on open access infrastructure, since the ISP – not Gigapower – is their point-of-contact.
What’s important is getting the message across to communities that Gigapower is doing a “one-time build that offers them enhanced competition, without a secondary infrastructure project that’s going to come in and be disruptive to the community,” said Seidenfaden.
Open access ROI
Although the open access model isn’t necessarily as “transactionally focused” as a traditional ISP, the return on investment still matters, Seidenfaden said.
ROI is tied into a number of factors, he explained, such as how many tenants are on the network and how those ISPs are performing from a penetration standpoint. It’s important to have penetration rates “that you would expect from a carrier that has multiple ISPs that are performing across that network.”
Gigapower is just one of several U.S. open access network operators, alongside players such as Utopia, Intrepid, Si-Fi Networks, Tillman and more. However, Gigapower doesn’t view any of them as direct competitors.
“We’re all out there to do the same thing,” Seidenfaden said. “I look at…how much stronger it makes all of us by having that voice out there of why open access is beneficial, of why giving consumers the choice of multiple providers isn’t about us competing with each other.”