Confirmed: Austin Gets Google Fiber
By Gilbert Falso :: 6:36 PM
What started as a rumor last last week and extended over the weekend has finally been confirmed today – yes, Austin, Texas is the next city on the list to get Google’s superfast Fiber Internet service.
The service will start to roll out to neighborhoods in 2014. Google has set up a website and a form for interested users to sign up so that the company can determine its schedule for rolling out the service, and what areas of the city would be good candidates for the initial fiber service installations.
Google selected Austin because the city, “is known globally as a mecca for creative and entrepreneurial people, including musicians, artists, tech companies, and the University of Texas and its new medical research hospital to name a few,” Google said in a press release. “High-speed ubiquitous connectivity can make an immediate impact on the work of all of these groups.”
David Burrows, Vice President of Corporate Marketing at Cinsay, an Austin company that offers a bandwidth-intense platform that merges video and ecommerce along with distribution via social media, is excited for the introduction of Google Fiber to the city. He believes that the availability of Fiber will help “brand Austin ahead of many tech competitors around the country in terms of how Google views the city as a technology developer and leader.”
“Google’s entrance into the Austin market is a classic ‘build it and they will come'” scenario, Burrows believes. With access to superfast Internet, Austin will be more appealing to established tech companies and startups alike.
Although a big name in the market, Google is not the first to bring fiber connections to the city.
“We already have at least two sources of fiber to the home, at least close in to the city,” explained James Krewson, the founder of the FindersCheapers.com price comparison website. Portions of Austin are already served by Grande Communications and AT&T U-Verse.
“The question is,” says Krewson, “how much bigger is the draw of Google’s 1000 Mbps service versus, say, AT&T’s 24Mbps. For my small web company, its a pretty big plus.”