Comcast has announced that it will be offering an Internet service that is twice as fast as Google Fiber, offering 2 Gbps.
Not only that, but the company will also be offering the service in Atlanta, a city that already offers Google Fiber. Could this mean a spark of competition among Internet service providers in America?
The real concern here is that Comcast is going to use its status as offering the fastest Internet in the country in order to charge crazy prices. Given then fact that Comcast is constantly rated as one of the worst companies in the country, it certainly seems like that this will happen.
Not only that, but Comcast also currently offers users 505 Mbps, around a quarter of the speed of 2 Gbps, for a whopping $399.95 per month. This is compared to Google Fiber, which is only $70 per month for 1 Gbps. Comcast has said that customers of its 505 Mbps service will be upgraded to Gigabit Pro, which is the 2 Gbps service and that the price will be lower than $400. Just how much lower remains to be seen.
The move highlights the waves that Google has been making in the Internet market since it first began offering Gigabit Internet. Comcast has been known to be able to charge as much as it wants for Internet, however, when Google first began offering Fiber, a glimpse of hope of competition surfaced. Google has been expanding the service, recently announcing that it would make its way to a number of additional cities.
If, however, Comcast does offer the service at a competitive price, it could seriously spark a contest between it and Google, which is only likely to expand even more as time goes on. Comcast says that it will grow the service to be available to as many as 18 million homes by the beginning of 2016. Not only that, but the company will reportedly also be offering a 1 Gbps service, matching Google's offering, which will be available to every customer who already uses Comcast Internet. There is also no word on pricing for this service, but again, if it is comparable to Google's offering, it could spark a serious rivalry.
Comcast also says that the service will be symmetrical, meaning that users will be able to upload just as fast as they can download, which is somewhat rare for Comcast, which usually offers a much slower upload speed than download speed.
Another factor in the competition will be consumer trust. Most agree that Comcast's customer service is absolutely horrible, but Google has managed to build a reputation of being reliable in spite of many being concerned over the fact that the company collects so much data about users.
