AT&T Is Buying 95% of Lumen’s Quantum Fiber. Will Prices Go Up?

AT&T is purchasing around 95% of Lumen’s Quantum Fiber service for $5.75 billion, the company announced in a statement on Wednesday. 

AT&T Fiber is currently available to 12.77% of US households, while Quantum Fiber reaches 2.26%, according to the most recent FCC data. According to Bloomberg, the sale is expected to close in the first half of next year. 

“This deal with Lumen represents a significant investment in US connectivity infrastructure,” said AT&T CEO John Stankey in a statement. “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.”

It’s been a busy few days in the broadband world, with the announcement coming on the heels of Verizon winning FCC approval for its purchase of Frontier’s fiber business and Charter announcing a merger with Cox just last week. Now, AT&T — already the most far-reaching fiber internet provider in the country — will add another 1 million customers through Quantum Fiber. Lumen also operates a DSL network through its CenturyLink brand. 

I’ve been covering the broadband industry for seven years, and I can tell you that internet providers absolutely love their mergers and rebrands. But I’ve never seen anything quite like this. By my count, six of the 10 largest internet providers by subscribers are involved in these three deals. 

Assuming they go through, roughly half of the country’s 132.6 million internet connections will be delivered by one of three providers — and that jumps to 72% if you add in Comcast. 

“The major companies have different theories of the best way to get bigger but all agree that there are still scale advantages to be achieved,” Blair Levin, a former FCC chief of staff and a telecom industry analyst at New Street Research, told CNET. “As the broadband markets are now fully penetrated — that is pretty much everyone who wants and can afford broadband is a customer of a provider — the advantage in the future will be lower cost structures through scale advantages.”

There isn’t a lot of market overlap between the companies that are joining forces, so you won’t necessarily wake up to find one less internet option. But we already have an internet monopoly problem in this country, with more than a third of Americans having access to one or no internet provider, according to the most recent FCC data.

Will Quantum Fiber prices increase?

You won’t see any changes immediately, but it’s an open question whether Quantum Fiber internet bills will go up once the deal goes through. 

Right now, Quantum Fiber’s plans are $50 monthly for 500Mbps speeds, compared to $65 for the same speeds through AT&T Fiber. Quantum Fiber also offers a “Price for Life” promotion on all of its plans, but states that rates are “subject to continued plan availability.” 

“While it is too early to comment on any pricing plans post-acquisition, we continue to prioritize putting our customers first and take pride in the great value we deliver customers today with AT&T Fiber,” an AT&T spokesperson told CNET.