TDS Telecommunications LLC in a Feb. 17 statement shared its progress toward achieving the company’s long-term fiber broadband goals, as reflected in its fourth quarter earnings report.
The telecommunications company said it ended the year with 582,000 marketable fiber service addresses, 39% of total addresses served by fiber, and 66% offering 1Gig or higher speeds.
Key accomplishments from 2022 include a 9% increase in its service footprint, which came from delivering 133,000 marketable fiber service addresses.
This is a 50% increase over what the company delivered in the prior year, with 60,000 of those service addresses added in the fourth quarter.
At year-end, the company had about 100 communities in various stages of fiber development.
The company further shared that its broadband investments are driving positive results. TDS experienced a 4% year over year increase in total broadband residential connections and is seeing a demand for greater broadband speeds with 72% of customers taking 100Mbps or greater.
In some markets the company is now offering 8Gig speeds. TDS said its focus on fast, reliable service has generated an 8% increase in total residential broadband revenue for the quarter.
Total revenues increased 1% for the quarter and the full year, as broadband growth offsets legacy declines.
TDS SVP and CFO Michelle Brukwicki commented:
“We are growing our scale and revenue, primarily through fiber market expansions, and we are continuously streamlining and automating operations to reduce legacy costs. We keep the customer at the center of everything we do, continuously investing in customer experience improvements. The foundation of our entire business is our highly engaged, resilient and dedicated workforce.”
TDS noted it continues to address the broadband needs in its most rural markets by upgrading its copper networks with support from state broadband grant programs and by meeting obligations under the federal A-CAM program. The company said it is optimistic the FCC will adopt an extension of the A-CAM program.
“We believe extending the current federal A-CAM program first, and then pursuing BEAD (Broadband Equity, Access and Development) program funding, would provide the fastest path for TDS to take fiber deeper into our communities,” added Brukwicki.
In conclusion, TDS provided company guidance for 2023, forecasting revenues of $1.03 billion to $1.06 billion. The company said this forecast reflects the goal of top-line growth driven by continued improvements in residential revenues across all markets, offsetting declines in legacy parts of the business.
The company said it will continue scaling up to deliver 175,000 fiber service addresses in 2023, an increase of over 30% from what TDS delivered in 2022.