By Tamara Chuang | Colorado Sun
AT&T’s $5.75 billion purchase of Lumen Technologies home fiber-internet business will impact 1 million customers nationwide, including an undisclosed number in Colorado who buy fiber service from Quantum Fiber, a brand that originated under CenturyLink.
The deal, pending regulatory approval, was announced Wednesday, and means AT&T will step into the consumer world of fiber internet service for the first time, at least here in Colorado.
Besides picking up Lumen’s Colorado market, AT&T will add customers in 10 other states for a total of 1 million fiber customers. Lumen’s current network could serve 4 million households if every home ordered it.
“This deal with Lumen represents a significant investment in U.S. connectivity infrastructure that will create jobs and spur economic activity in numerous regions and major metro areas across 11 states,” John Stankey, AT&T’s chairman and CEO, said in a news release. “As we advance our fiber build, we’ll serve more communities with world-class connectivity and expect to roughly double where AT&T Fiber is available by the end of 2030.”
Besides Colorado, AT&T also gains entry into Idaho, Iowa, Nebraska, Oregon, Utah and Washington, according to a spokesperson. Service is already available in 21 states. Building on its current footprint and the additional Lumen territory, AT&T believes the network it will build can reach a potential of 60 million customers in five years.
For Lumen, the sale was about focusing on enterprise customers and the anticipated growth of artificial intelligence and support companies need.
“We see two distinctly important trends,” Lumen CEO Kate Johnson said in a video announcing the deal. “AI has emerged as the mission critical technology for enterprise and consumer wireless and fiber to the home demands are converging. … We’re reinventing Lumen to power the digital future for enterprise.”
Monroe, La.-based Lumen is a reinvention of CenturyLink, which renamed itself five years ago. In 2011, the company merged with Denver-based Qwest Communications to become one of the nation’s largest telecoms.