World Broadband Future Seems Bright

In the United States, cable broadband retains a significant lead over DSL wheras in the rest of the world, DSL is the medium of choice in an ever larger broadband Internet market.

by Robyn Greenspan of cyberatlas.internet.com [August 16, 2002]

Dialup could be in decline, according to reports that predict robust growth in the broadband industry. While 2002 began with more than 32 million broadband subscribers, In-Stat/MDR expects worldwide subscriber broadband totals to surpass 46 million by the end of the year, and eMarketer forecasts 117 million broadband households worldwide in 2004.

eMarketer found that while North America held the lead through 2001 with 13.5 million broadband households (of which 8.2 million are cable Internet users, and 5 million are DSL subscribers), the Asia-Pacific region will contain more broadband subscriptions than North America and Latin America combined, at nearly 50 million by 2004.

Interestingly, In-Stat/MDR research indicates that DSL is the connection of world choice. DSL subscriptions surpassed 17 million, with the service's popularity mostly attributed to the sharp rise in the number of DSL subscribers in the in the Asia-Pacific region.

However, in the U.S., cable modems continue to outnumber DSL subscriptions—7.12 million households are cable modem-equipped and only 4.6 million are using DSL as of the beginning of 2002.

Accounting for 5 percent of the broadband market are less popular technologies, such as satellite broadband, fiber to the home (FTTH), and fixed wireless service.

Analysis from Leichtman Research Group revealed that the leading cable and DSL providers in the U.S. added a combined 1.37 million broadband Internet subscribers in the second quarter of 2002, with cable continuing to hold a commanding 65 percent share of the growing broadband market. In further comparison, the top cable companies added over 3.5 million broadband Internet subscribers, while DSL providers added 1.9 million.

"High speed Internet growth was clearly a bright spot in an otherwise very challenging quarter for the cable industry," said Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group, Inc. "Cable continues to grow its high speed Internet base, and strongly outpaces DSL providers in adding new subscribers."

U.S. Cable vs. DSL, Second Quarter 2002
	Broadband Subs	Net Q2 Adds
Cable
Time Warner	2,466,000	271,000
AT&T	1,762,000	137,000
Comcast	1,168,900	128,400
Cox	1,115,000	113,689
Charter	905,500	157,800
Cablevision	610,505	50,740
Adelphia	377,500	NA
RCN (Overbuilder)	149,602	12,807
Mediacom	145,000	18,000
Insight	103,400	8,900
Cable One	56,000	11,600
Total Top Cable	8,859,407	909,936
DSL
SBC	1,700,000	213,000
Verizon	1,500,000	150,000
Bell South	803,000	74,000
Qwest	508,000	24,000
Covad (CLEC)	179,000	(1,000)
Total Top DSL	4,690,000	460,000
Total Broadband	13,549,407	1,369,936
Source: The Companies and Leichtman Research Group, Inc. All data from Q2 2002, except Adelphia from Q4 2001 (last reported information) Subscriber counts may not represent solely residential households. For example, Charter Communications notes that commercial accounts are calculated on an equivalent modem unit (EMU) basis, and represent about 8 percent of its modem subscribers.

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