Cable Wireless MVNOs Set for Further Growth in 2024

Cable wireless mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) are important component of the effectively competitive wireless communications market. The two largest cable MVNO services – Comcast's Xfinity Mobile and Charter's Spectrum Mobile – have been in operation only a handful of years. Although their subscribership is far below the three major mobile wireless providers T-Mobile, Verizon, and AT&T, cable MVNOs have made modest but steady gains ever since they entered into the wireless market. According to recent reports, Xfinity Mobile finished 2023 with 6.58 million subscribers and Spectrum Mobile finished with 7.8 million.  

There remains plenty of room for growth in 2024, as cable MVNOs continue to explore using their own licensed CBRS spectrum to carry mobile wireless traffic and reduce reliance on leased spectrum. According to an article published on January 10 of this year in LightReading, Cox Mobile also is looking to expand its wireless offerings in 2024, and it is now conducting tests on licensed CBRS spectrum for fixed wireless access (FWA) applications. As noted in a February 2023 article in FierceWireless, Cox paid $200 million for CBRS spectrum licensees auctioned by the FCC. Cox Communications is not publicly traded and doesn't publish subscriber numbers. 

Cable MVNOs Subscribership Continues to Climb in 2023

Cable wireless mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) are effective intermodal competitors in today's communications marketplace. An article published in Fierce Wireless on October 27 of this year summarizes third quarter growth in cable MVNO services by the two largest services, Comcast's Xfinity Mobile and Charter's Spectrum Mobile:

Comcast yesterday reported the company added 294,000 wireless lines in Q3 2023. Comcast now has 6.2 million wireless lines in total. In contrast, Charter today reported it added 594,000 wireless lines in Q3, bringing its total wireless lines to 7.2 million.

My August 1 blog post observed that in the second quarter of 2023, Xfinity Mobile gained 316,000 lines and Spectrum Mobile gained 648,000 lines. 

 

Significant growth potential remains for both cable MVNO services within their respective geographic footprints. And as noted in the Fierce Wireless article, the cost-efficiency and competitiveness of those services is likely to improve in the near future as a result of buildouts of their own wireless infrastructure using small cells and licensed CBRS spectrum. Deployment of such networks as well as increased offloading of mobile traffic onto cable MVNO wi-fi networks, will make hybrid cable MVNOs less and less "virtual" and make their services less costly to provide by reducing their reliance on leasing wholesale access to mobile cellular networks. 

 

Importantly, the mobile broadband choices offered by cable MVNO services did not exist when the FCC imposed public utility regulation on mobile broadband Internet access services in the 2015 Title II Order. That order proffered "switching costs" for mobile broadband consumers and supposed incentives and ability by mobile providers to unreasonably discriminate against their own subscribers as supposed justifications for imposing public utility regulation. Commentsfiled with the FCC by the Free State Foundation in July 2017 explained that those rationales were not persuasive. In late 2023, competition from cable MVNOs further undermines those rationales for imposing public utility regulation. Any wireless provider that blocks or throttles their own subscribers' access to legal content via the Internet or otherwise unreasonably discriminates against their own subscribers risks massive loss of subscribership. Instead of foisting new regulatory restrictions on mobile broadband providers to address non-existent harms, the Commission should maintain the pro-market, pro-investment, and pro-innovation federal light-touch policy set forth in the 2018 Restoring Internet Freedom Order. 

Cable Mobile Wireless MVNOs Off to Strong Start in 2023

Comcast's Xfinity Mobile and Charter's Spectrum Mobile released their latest quarterly number for subscriber additions, both of which are summed up nicely in a May 1 FierceWireless article by Linda Hardesty:

Comcast added 355,000 net wireless lines in its first quarter 2023. During the same quarter, Charter added a whopping 686,000 Spectrum Mobile lines — an indication that its 12-month Spectrum One bundled promotion is paying off in garnering new subscribers.

Comcast now counts 5.7 million lines for its mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) service, while Charter counts 6 million total lines.

A May 10 FierceWireless article by the same author also calls attention to Spectrum Mobile’s sharing of Wi-Fi networks with Xfinity mobile as well as other Wi-Fi network partners. It is reported that about 85% of Spectrum Mobile’s data traffic is carried on Wi-Fi and the remainder is carried on Verizon Wireless’s cellular network pursuant to an MVNO agreement. And Spectrum Mobile is now beginning to put some of Charter’s CBRS (3.5 GHz) spectrum into use in order to reduce further its dependency on third party-cellular networks.

Although cable wireless MVNO subscribership is still small compared to that of mobile cellular wireless providers such as AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon, C-Spire, and US Cellular, cable wireless MVNOs offer consumers a strong facilities-based competitive choice for mobile wireless broadband services. The continued growth of cable MVNOs also is a testament to private innovation and investment as well as the importance of making more spectrum available for commercial uses, both on a licensed and on an unlicensed basis. 

 

The competitive state of the broadband marketplace is the subject of my Perspectives from FSF Scholars from January of this year: "The 2022 Communications Marketplace Report: Timely FCC Action Could Accelerate Next-Gen Broadband Deployment."

Cable Mobile Wireless MVNOs Set Record With New Subscribers

On October 27 and 28, Comcast and Charter Communications each released their third quarter results for 2022. Both Comcast's Xfinity Mobile and Charter's Spectrum Mobile posted record numbers of net subscriber additions for their cable mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) wireless services. Comcast reported 330,000 wireless net subscriber additions during the third quarter, bringing Xfinity Mobile's total subscribership to 4.95 million. And this last week Xfinity Mobile announced that it has surpassed 5 million subscribers. Meanwhile, Charter reported 396,000 net subscriber additions, bringing the total number of Spectrum Mobile subscriber lines up to 4.7 million. 

Cable MVNO services – which include Altice – combine cable network facilities, including Wi-Fi hot spots, with spectrum leased from Verizon Wireless. This hybrid model enables cable MVNOs to serve subscribers outside of their respective traditional cable video geographic footprints. As described in the Free State Foundation's July 2022 comments to the FCC for its forthcoming 2022 Communications Marketplace Report, these mobile wireless offerings by cable MVNOs are an increasingly important source of intermodal competition, giving consumers an attractively-priced wireless alternative to mobile wireless carriers. Cable MVNO wireless offerings include 5G wireless, and they also are offered to consumers in bundles with fixed broadband as well as with cable video. 

As observed in my May 2 blog post, cable wireless MVNOs are continuing to pursue strategies for offloading mobile wireless traffic onto their own licensed spectrum in select geographic areas, creating cost savings from reduced reliance on leased spectrum. The future prospects for cable MVNOs appear to remain strong, and American consumers stand to benefit from their innovative and competitive offerings. 

Cable Mobile Wireless MVNOs: 8.4 Million Subscribers and Counting

A September article by Jeff Baumgartner at LightReading spotlights the continued growth in wireless services offered by cable mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) offered by Comcast's Xfinity Mobile, Charter Communications' Spectrum Mobile, and Altice USA's Optimum Mobile. According to the article, at the end of the second quarter of 2022, those three cable MVNOs added a combined 703,000 mobile lines for a total of 8.4 million. Although that figure reportedly amounts to less than 3% of the U.S. mobile wireless market, the article cited a MoffettNathanson estimate that cable MVNOs gained almost 44% of net mobile adds for that quarter. And the 8.4 million figure for cable MVNO subscriber lines is up from the 6.5 million total from a year prior that was noticed in my August 2021 blog post.  

The LightReading article is particularly interesting because it highlights an analysis of mobile postpaid plans by categories by Navi. According to the article, "Navi's Q2 2022 Wireless Plan Scoring Report" apparently ranks Spectrum Mobile the highest among competing mobile providers in the entry-level and value categories, with Xfinity Mobile also performing strongly in the value category. As the article observes, cable MVNO services are offered in discount bundles with residential cable broadband Internet access services. 

My blog post on May 2 of this year noted that Comcast and Charter are looking to expand their Wi-Fi and cable network offloading capabilities to more cost-effectively provide cable MVNO services. Added to that intriguing development is Cox Communications' August 29 announcement of its launch of a three-city pilot for its Cox Mobile MVNO service. Suffice to day, the continued growth of cable MVNO networks will likely remain interesting to watch in 2022 and beyond. 

Cable Continues to Gain Traction in the Mobile Wireless Market

Cable broadband operators have proved again that they are a potent source of competition in the mobile wireless market. During the first quarter 2022, Charter gained 373,000 net subscribers to its Spectrum Wireless service. This raised Charter's wireless subscriber base to 3.9 million as of the end of the first quarter, a 47.2% increase compared to a year earlier. Meanwhile, Comcast gained 318,000 subscribers to its Xfinity Mobile service. At quarter's end, Comcast's wireless subscribers had risen to almost 4.3 million. And Altice added 12,000 subscribers to its Optimum Mobile wireless service during the first quarter, reaching a total 198,000 subscribers.

Free State Foundation Legal Fellow Andrew Maglouglin and I called attention to the quick rise of cable mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) and their benefits to wireless consumers in our Perspectives from FSF Scholars, "The Broadband Internet Services Market in January 2022: 5G, Cable, Fixed Wireless, Wi-Fi 6, and Fiber Are Benefitting Consumers." The impressive first quarter 2022 results reported by cable MVNOs indicate that consumers are continuing to take interest in these innovative choices for wireless services. 

 

Aside from positive subscriber addition numbers for early 2022, the competitive outlook for cable MVNOs is strong because of their ability to leverage their existing cable and wi-fi network infrastructure to offload mobile wireless traffic. It is reported that about 85% of Spectrum Mobile subscribers' mobile usage goes through Charter's Wi-Fi network. And Charter's joint venture with Comcast to offload traffic using CBRS spectrum reportedly is in early trial stages. Expect to hear more about cable's growing stature in the mobile wireless market. 

Cable Mobile Wireless MVNOs: 6.5 Million Subscribers and Counting

Over the last few years, Free State Foundation scholars have taken note of the potential competition in the mobile wireless market from entrant cable providers, including Comcast's Xfinity Mobile and Charter Communications' Spectrum Mobile. These cable mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) combine their broadband network capacity and mobile hotspots with leased spectrum. For a helpful summary of the latest reported numbers, see the July 30 article by Diana Goovaerts in FierceWireless titled "Cable MVNOs add 550,000 wireless subs in Q2." According to the article, cable providers now have a combined total of 6.5 million mobile wireless subscribers. At the end of the first quarter of 2020, there were about 2.5 million combined subscribers. And at the end of the second quarter of 2019, there were about 2.1 million. These cable wireless MVNOs now offer 5G services. At some point, cable wireless MVNOs may be offloading mobile traffic onto their own licensed spectrum in select areas, thereby saving spectrum leasing costs. Expect to hear more about competitive cable MVNOs in the time ahead. 

Cable Wireless Subscribership Continues to Grow

During the first quarter of 2020, Comcast's Xfinity Mobile added 216,000 new wireless subscribers for a total of nearly 2.3 million. Charter Communications' Spectrum Mobile added 290,000 new subscribers for 1.4 million total. Those increases in subscribers compared to early 2019 provide further evidence of the competitiveness of cable hybrid Wi-Fi/Cellular mobile wireless services. Unlike mobile virtual network operators (MVNOs) that are pure resellers of services provided through facilities-based cellular wireless providers, Comcast and Charter use their own facilities to transmit offloaded voice and data traffic. The continuing growth of these cable hybrid Wi-Fi/Cellular mobile services is worth watching here in 2020. 

Cable Wireless Service Entrants Poised to Increase Market's Competitiveness

Yesterday, Free State Foundation President Randolph May and I filed public comments with the U.S. Department of Justice regarding its proposed settlement for the T-Mobile/Sprint merger. Our comments addressed the dynamic communications market context of the proposed merger, including existing and potential competition to wireless carriers: 

Wireless market entry by Comcast and Charter Communications using hybrid Wi- Fi/cellular mobile wireless networks further diminish the likelihood of significant price increases or other anti-competitive conduct post-merger. Traditional cable operators are established providers of bundled voice, video, and data services. They are well suited to provide competitive mobile wireless services by leveraging their existing broadband network capacity and nationwide deployment of Wi-Fi hotspots and leasing network capacity for out-of-area voice and data transmission. As of the second quarter of 2019, Xfinity Mobile reportedly served 1.6 million subscribers and Spectrum Mobile reportedly served 518,000 subscribers. Those subscriber numbers are widely expected to increase. 

Close attention ought to be paid to future subscriber numbers for both cable wireless entrants. But there are other indications that these new entrants will further increase the market's competitiveness for mobile wireless services. According to reports, Xfinity Mobile and Spectrum Mobile are both increasing mobile data traffic offloads from leased Verizon network capacity onto their cable Wi-Fi networks. This competitive strategy reduces their lease payments. Also, both Xfinity Mobile and Spectrum Mobile reportedly have plans in the works to offer 5G wireless network services in future. And the largest multi-regional wireless carrier has reportedly acknowledged publicly competitive pressures by cable wireless entrants. 

(H/T to LightReading's Mike Dano for his incisive reporting and analysis.) 

Charter's New Wireless Service "Spectrum Mobile" Increases Competition

Last month, Charter Communications launched a new mobile wireless broadband service, Spectrum Mobile. Spectrum Mobile’s unlimited data plan starts at just $45 a month. Consumers will enjoy the benefits of over $27 billion in technology and infrastructure invested by Charter since 2014. Spectrum Mobile consumers who also use Charter’s fixed broadband service will enjoy high-speed connections at home and on the go.

This new wireless offering solidifies Charter as one of the leaders in both wireline and wireless broadband, and it spurs further competition in the broadband market. Charter joins Comcast as the other major cable provider to enter into the mobile wireless market. This benefits consumers by putting downward pressure on wireless prices and by encouraging additional network investment from wireless competitors.