In this week’s top stories: Specs for the rumored HTC ‘Sailfish’ Nexus device leak, more on the OnePlus 3, Google’s new Prompt two-factor feature, we review Sony’s Xperia X, and much more.
We heard earlier this month that Google was planning to offer Fiber customers the option of a wireless service within its existing coverage areas, but a Re/code interview suggests that the company also sees wireless as a way to extend its reach beyond cities.
In an interview with Re/code, Access CEO Craig Barratt, who oversees Fiber, said the company is working on connecting wireless towers to existing fiber lines, and that it is “experimenting with a number of different wireless technologies” to make that happen.
Barratt said that adding wireless into the mix was a way to extend Google’s high-speed broadband service to areas where laying down optical fiber wouldn’t be economic …
Google Fiber, part of Alphabet’s Access unit, is up and running in four cities and work is underway in another six. Fiber’s expansion into Huntsville, Alabama will be slightly different in that Google will be using the fiber network that the city is already building.
As part of giving back to the community, Google is providing free gigabit internet service to residents in all public housing where Fiber is deployed. This is a change from an announcement last year where only some in public housing would get free Fiber.
Craig Barrat was previously Google’s SVP of “access and energy,” but now he leads an Alphabet unit as CEO. That unit is called Access and Energy, and includes Google’s Fiber division as well as several other access and energy-related products (as Google’s Ruth Porat noted in its Q3 2015 earnings call). Now, thanks to an extensive profile of Access today out of Re/code, we have a little bit more of an idea of exactly which projects fall under this group…
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Google Fiber is slowly but surely gaining momentum, and the Mountain View company just last month announced that it began exploring Irvine, Louisville, and San Diego as potential cities for the service. Today, it looks like there are three more cities being added to the “maybe one day” list (which is definitely an upgrade from the “who knows” list most cities are still on): Oklahoma City, Oklahom, Jacksonville, Florida, and Tampa, Florida.
Google says these “growing tech hubs” have a “strong entrepreneurial spirit”:
That’s why today, we’re inviting Oklahoma City, OK, Jacksonville, FL and Tampa, FL, to explore bringing Google Fiber to their communities, as we did last month with three other cities. These growing tech-hubs have a strong entrepreneurial spirit and commitment to small business growth. Their list of accolades is long—from Jacksonville’s title as a top 10 city for tech jobs, to Tampa Bay’s #2 spot on the list of best cities for young entrepreneurs, to Oklahoma City’s recognition as the #1 city to launch a business. One of our goals is to make sure speed isn’t an accidental ceiling for how people and businesses use the Web, and these cities are the perfect places to show what’s possible with gigabit Internet.
There are currently 3 Fiber cities, and 6 that are definitely on the way. This announcement leaves us with 9 cities that Google has designated as potentials, with the other 6 being Portland, San Jose, Irving, San Diego, Louisville, and Phoenix. Now, Google is going to start the “joint planning process” in collaboration with the three new cities’ local leaders to study their respective communities. Now it’s just a waiting game for those lucky enough to reside in these cities.
Google’s recent reorganization under its parent company Alphabet Inc. will bring about several changes for its smaller startup companies, the Wall Street Journal reports. Those smaller companies, such as Nest, are known as “bets” in Alphabet and will have a significantly higher amount of freedom than before.
Google today has announced that it will begin “exploring” the expansion of Google Fiber to three new cities. The company announced in a blog post that it will begin working with city officials in Louisville, KY, Irvine, CA, and San Diego, CA to plan the launch of Fiber. The announcement of Fiber coming to San Diego makes it the largest city for the service to date. Previously, San Antonio was the largest city with plans for Fiber.
Following a trial period in Palo Alto, Kansas City was the first city to get Google Fiber. Today, Google (Alphabet?) has announced that its offerings in Kansas City are expanding, as some addresses in Olathe East are now eligible for Gigabit Internet + TV.
As you may be aware, Google founder Larry Page said when Alphabet was launched that Fiber would become its own subsidiary under the newly-formed conglomerate, sitting independent of Google with its own CEO. For now, the company is still operating under the Google Fiber name.
If you’re a resident of the Olathe East area and have been patiently waiting for access to Fiber, you can now head over to the Fiber website and give it your address. If your residence is located within the blue area shown below, chances are that you’re now eligible.
With the announcement that Google has completely reorganized its entire business under a new parent company called Alphabet, there are still many questions floating around about what products belong with what companies now.
Thanks to Google’s SEC filing, we’ve got some answers on that front.
Google has announced today that the company is bringing its Fiber Internet service to San Antonio, the second city in Texas to get the service and the company’s “largest Fiber city to date”:
Fast growing cities need Internet speeds that can keep up with their progress. For the 1.4 million residents of San Antonio, one of the biggest and fastest growing cities in the country, this is truer than ever. Which is why, today, we’re proud to announce that Google Fiber is coming to San Antonio—the largest Fiber city to date.
Rollout of Fiber even in the Austin area — which has been an official Fiber city for quite a while — has been very slow, and Google says that it is only just now entering the “design phase” of building out Fiber in the San Antonio area. It’s going to be a while before residential customers can actually get on board.
Most recently, Google announced that it is launching a program to bring completely free internet access to public and affordable housing residents in four of its Google Fiber markets — part of President Barack Obama’s ConnectHome initiative. San Antonio was recently selected for ConnectHome as well.
Google announced today that it is launching a program to bring completely free internet access to public and affordable housing residents in four of its Google Fiber markets. The initiative is part of President Barack Obama’s ConnectHome initiative, which hopes to bring broadband connections to low-income households in communities across the United States…
The web is where we go to connect with people, learn new subjects, and find opportunities for personal and economic growth. But not everyone benefits from all the web has to offer. As many as 26% of households earning less than $30,000 per year don’t access the Internet, compared to just 3% of adults with annual incomes over $75,000. Google Fiber is working to change that. Today, in all of our Google Fiber markets, we’re launching a program to connect residents in select public and affordable housing properties for $0/month with no installation fee.
Google says that the program aims to bring Internet to children and families living in homes under the assistance of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. This currently includes 27 communities, four of which are Google Fiber markets where the Mountain View company will be able to contribute: Atlanta, Durham, Nashville and Kansas City. Google says it’s coming to future Fiber markets as well.
Even though Google announced in December of last year that sign-ups for its Fiber TV and Internet service were live to residents of southern and southeastern Austin, they’ve actually been opened and closed several times. Sign-ups are going live in the southeastern section yet again today, according to the official Twitter account for the company’s broadband cable and Internet subsidiary.
Google finalized a deal to acquire Surprise, Arizona startup Athena Wireless Communications in February of this year, according to reports. The company has been around for several years and has spent much of that time building wireless LTE and small cell technologies that can move data at gigabit Fiber-like speeds. The acquisition is an obvious one for a company such as Google that is continuing to build out its Google Fiber infrastructure and has plans to announce its own MVNO…
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Comcast has come out today to announce that they’re prepping to beat Google Fiber to Atlanta—but they’re not just going for par; the company wants to one-up the offerings of Google and AT&T by introducing previously unheard-of 2Gbps residential Internet service. It will be “the fastest residential Internet speed in the country,” the infamous media conglomerate says.
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The process of bringing Google Fiber to new markets is a lengthy and messy political one as we’ve seen since the initiative first started in mid-2012. Google’s map of potential Fiber cities shared just over a year ago is mostly unchanged save for the southeast region moving to the upcoming Fiber cities category earlier this year.
Local government in Portland, a potential Fiber city on Google’s radar, actually unanimously approved plans for Fiber shortly after Google shared its potential expansion cities. More recently, though, Oregon lawmakers have created minor road blocks ahead of Fiber’s possible expansion to Portland. The kicker here is that the proposed legislation was actually intended to make Portland more appealing to Google…
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Google Fiber has been instigating the growth of fiber Internet in the United States for a few years, and now AT&T is feeling the heat more than ever. Announced at midnight last night, AT&T said it’s finally ready to start selling fiber Internet services in Kansas City and its surrounding areas (via The Kansas City Star). The company finished the rollout of 1Gbps “GigaPower” service in Austin late last year, and now it seems it’s finally time for AT&T to live up to its promise to bring the service to other cities around the country…
We told you yesterday that Google was planning to bring Google Fiber to a handful of new cities, and today the Mountain View company has officially announced the expansion of its gigabit broadband service to Atlanta, Georgia; Charlotte, North Carolina; Nashville, Tennessee; and Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina.
Update: The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Google is planning to announce Google Fiber expansion to four new cities: Atlanta, Georgia; Charlotte, N.C.; Raleigh-Durham, N.C. and Nashville, Tenn.
Both Charlotte and Raleigh-Durham in North Carolina have long been listed as potential Google Fiber cities, and Ars Technica reports that these cities could be the next to offer the super high speed Internet and TV service with announcements expected next week and construction possibly beginning as soon as April.
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After revealing pricing last week, Google has today opened signups for Fiber in Austin, Texas. Google is starting its Austin rollout by opening signups in the southern and southeastern sections of the city. The company will expand the rollout to other portions of Austin “on an ongoing basis.” Both residents and small businesses in the pre-determined Fiberhoods can signup for the service today.
Google promised back in July that its deal to provide free WiFi at 7,000 U.S. Starbucks locations would include connections up to 100x faster than usual in cities with Google Fiber – and it has now started to deliver on that. The company announced in its Google Fiber blog that a Kansas City branch is now home to the fastest Starbucks WiFi in the U.S.
At the corner of 41st and Main Street, a Kansas City Starbucks is teeming with people writing emails, streaming music, sharing videos, and more. Now that same Starbucks—one of the busiest in Kansas City—is the first to be connected directly to Google Fiber, so anyone visiting the store can get super-fast Internet with their Pumpkin Spice Latte.
The technofest doesn’t end there, either …
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Google Fiber is about ready to launch in its third city, according to The Wall Street Journal. The service is apparently about 3 months behind original schedule, and sign ups will be launched this December focusing on the south and southeastern parts of the city. The company’s original announcement touted “mid-2014” for launch, but it looks like laying groundwork for a fiber internet service isn’t exactly an easy task.
According to a new report from the Wall Street Journal, Google is planning to spend more than $1 billion to expand internet access to unwired regions of the world with a fleet of satellites. According to “people familiar with the matter,” Google this time around is hoping that it can overcome financial and technical problems it has faced in the past with this goal.
Tom Wheeler — the Chairman of the FCC, the federal commission currently in the middle of a firestorm surrounding net neutrality — today praised Google for its checklist of requirements for cities to meet that are interested in working with Google to roll out fiber networking.
Google’s checklist includes various measures and decisions that help enable the company to quickly add their fiber services to a city or municipality. Wheeler specifically cites this as something that the FCC should look into, as it effectively cuts through red tape and speeds up deployment of faster service:
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