The Fiber to the Home (FTTH) Council Americas has released the results of a survey it commissioned to be conducted by RVA LLC, which shows that fiber deployments in the United States grew 13 percent in 2015.


“From our survey of North American broadband providers, we’ve found that fiber-to-the-home deployment has continued to grow steadily, and 2015 marks the second biggest year for expansion since the technology became available,” said Michael Render, RVA president. “The industry is poised for substantial growth over the next five years.”


Major findings from the 2015 survey include the following:


More fiber in more homes: The acceleration in U.S. FTTH deployment that began in 2011 continues. In 2015, fiber was made available for nearly 3 million new homes in the United States. Currently, 26 million U.S. homes are passed and marketed.


Higher standards yield higher results: 12.3 million U.S. homes are connected with FTTH. That represents almost a 50 percent take (the decision to use fiber technology) rate, which, according to the council, is very high by the world’s standards. Almost 20 percent of all true FTTH connections are in the United States.


Providers are setting their sights on gigabit service: The movement to both symmetrical and gigabit service continues in the United States and Canada. More than half of the more than 1,000 FTTH providers in North America expect to be offering 1 gigabit per second within five years.


North America grows together: Nearly 34 million homes in the United States, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean are passed and marketed. Canada’s growth has been accelerating, with 2.4 million homes marketed.


Happy consumers mean more growth: According to the survey, consumer experience and word-of-mouth drive most of the FTTH growth. FTTH consumers report more than 50 percent higher satisfaction with fiber than with DSL or cable. According to the FTTH Council, faster speeds and service reliability drive consumer satisfaction.


The FTTH Council Americas is a nonprofit association of companies and organizations that deliver video, internet and voice services over high-bandwidth, next-generation, direct fiber optic connections; it also includes entities involved in planning and building FTTH networks. Its mission is to accelerate deployment of all-fiber access networks by demonstrating how fiber-enabled applications and solutions create value for service providers and their customers, promote economic development and enhance quality of life.