This will greatly strengthen AT&T‘s national fiber network and broaden its reach in the high-speed internet market for residential customers.
Through the acquisition, AT&T will gain approximately 1 million fiber customers and significantly grow its fiber operations in key cities including Denver, Las Vegas, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Orlando, Phoenix, Portland, Salt Lake City, and Seattle. AT&T noted the strategic expansion in a statement, emphasizing the value of adding scale to its fiber infrastructure.
News of Lumen exploring a sale of the consumer fiber unit first emerged in December. According to Lumen’s Chief Financial Officer Chris Stansbury, the sale will allow the company to sharpen its focus on expanding its enterprise fiber segment. He also pointed out that the shift would enable further investment in low-latency technologies, which are increasingly important for supporting artificial intelligence applications across multi-cloud environments. Yeah, it’s all about AI these days…
Stansbury highlighted that customers are demanding faster innovation, especially in the context of AI-driven needs. He said the proceeds from the transaction would help reduce Lumen’s debt by $4.8 billion and lower annual interest expenses by over $300 million, resulting in stronger cash flow.
The deal is anticipated to close in the first half of 2026.
Image by PhoneArena
Not so long ago, AT&Tsuccessfully tested a groundbreaking 1.6 terabit-per-second (Tb/s) data transmission over a 296-kilometer stretch between Newark and Philadelphia. That’s amazing, it’s a fourfold increase over the current top network speeds.
The trial, conducted using existing infrastructure and open-network hardware, demonstrates the network’s readiness to meet soaring data demands driven by AI, streaming, and virtual reality. This was the first successful end-to-end transmission of two 800Gb Ethernet circuits on a single wavelength.
In simple terms, this means AT&T was able to send two super-fast internet data streams – each capable of handling 800 gigabits per second – together over a single beam of light through a fiber-optic cable. Think of it like fitting two high-speed trains on the same track without crashing, and both reaching their destination smoothly. It’s the first time this level of speed and efficiency has been achieved using just one light signal, which shows how much more data can now be moved faster and more efficiently on AT&T‘s network.
Meanwhile, T-Mobile is not sitting idle – last year, the company announced the acquisition of fiber Internet Service Provider Metronet, the largest privately-owned fiber provider in the United States. It’s delivering services to over 300 communities across 17 states and serving an estimated 2 million customers.
