Google may spend hundreds of millions of dollars to test 1 GB high-speed optical fiber broadband service

According to foreign media reports today, Google said it may spend up to hundreds of millions of dollars to develop experimental broadband services, providing 100 times faster than the current broadband network.

Google announced the pilot project earlier this month. Richard Whitt, a consultant for telecom and media affairs at Google in Washington, said the cost of this project is unknown because the network coverage and number of users are still unknown. Google has not yet decided on the location and size of the network. Google said that the number of network users may be between 50 thousand and 0.5 million.

Google has previously called on the US Federal Communications Commission to expand its broadband network. Google has invested in this project to demonstrate the potential of high-speed Internet services. Google also wants the network to be open to different software and technologies, not limited by service providers.

"This is not a trivial matter. We are trying to do this on the open network. We think this is a way to achieve our goal ." Google plans to deploy a 1 Gbps Optical Fiber Network, which is 20 times faster than Verizon's current fastest broadband service.

Scott Kessler, A stupp analyst, said the investment shows that Google is very serious about promoting broadband networks in the U.S. market. "There is no doubt that this is a huge amount of money," he said. Obviously, Google is experimenting with a very open attitude ."

"This is an open test platform. We will provide regular reports to the FCC and Other Organizations of Interest. We hope to experiment with useful experience in engineering and commerce ."

Ben Schachter, an analyst at broadpoint amtech, estimates that the cost of this network is between $3000 and $8000 per household, and the total cost is between $60 million and $1.6 billion. If the number of users is between 20 thousand and 0.2 million, the cost will be USD 0.5 billion in the middle.

Google is asking if other parties intend to participate in the project. The final deadline is March 26. Google will announce later this year where to deploy the network. Minnie Ingersoll, Google's product manager, said that Google is only focusing on testing projects and does not plan to provide broadband services nationwide.