Two important carriers in Eastern Pennsylvania's Direct LTx service footprint have begun the process of becoming one.  Verizon has acquired Frontier Communications in a deal valued at either $20 billion, according to CNN or $9.6 billion per The Wall Street Journal’s reporting.    

All can agree that Frontier has an impressive network in certain areas of the country, providing Verizon with a strengthened network and increased customer base. Pennsylvania is one of those regions, and pockets of strength for Frontier include Harrisburg, York, Scranton, Lancaster, and Allentown. 

This is an important development for interconnectivity in our region and good news for Direct LTx customers, as both companies are among the dozen carriers built into our Reading data center. Any Direct LTx customer using either carrier in our facility will now enjoy a more robust, redundant interconnection solution. They gain that additional resiliency without having to move any equipment or manage a migration. When one carrier buys another, it does not tear out fiber; instead, it leverages it. 

The more carriers and fiber built into a data center, the better for colocation customers. In Eastern Pennsylvania, there are many aging corporate data centers. Most have only a carrier or two, limiting their resiliency and dragging on their latency compared to availing themselves of multiple options in a well-networked, fiber-rich colocation facility.    

As a result of this acquisition competing carriers may pick up some business from customers that now utilize both Frontier and Verizon and will now seek to avoid overreliance on a single vendor. This merger benefits our customers, our vendors, the reliability of our Eastern Pennsylvania’s networks, and the business world in our region.