USA: report compares rural and urban broadband as input for national strategy

[PRNewswire]A new market report from Pivot Media offers insight into broadband growth across the U.S. and offers comparative analysis between rural and urban telecom service providers. With the broadband stimulus portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 as a backdrop, this new report offers valuable insight into broadband growth and access line loss trends among leading rural and urban telecom carriers. "The data within this report allows readers to put rural broadband growth and access line loss trends into context with more reported urban service provider trends. This analysis may prove helpful as the broadband stimulus program begins in earnest," says Bernie Arnason, managing partner of Pivot Media.

Among key findings, the report reveals rural service providers enjoyed slightly better sequential broadband growth in 2008 than urban providers. While growth in broadband slowed dramatically in 2Q08 for both rural and urban providers, rural providers enjoyed roughly a two-to-one sequential rate of growth over their urban counterparts in the period. "Even though broadband growth slowed overall in 2008, rural service providers consistently led urban service providers in broadband growth on a percentage basis," says Arnason. Ongoing growth in broadband is increasingly important to the business of service providers operating in all regions, given ongoing access line loss and increased competition from alternative providers. Providers in rural markets have an opportunity to strengthen broadband capacity with access to $7.2 billion in funds available via the broadband stimulus portion of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. As the rate of access line loss accelerates, the business of all telecom service providers is dependent on broadband expansion through the deployment of next-generation technology which can be used to deliver cost effective, fast and reliable broadband services.

The full report is available for download at http://pivot-media.com/trends.

New Study Compares U.S. Rural and Urban Provider Broadband, Access Line Trends