Alphabet’s Access division has hired Greg McCray as CEO and is reducing its employee count by hundreds. McCray is a specialist in broadband which seems to make him a perfect fit for the job. This isn’t the only change, though, with Alphabet moving a number of Access employees to different divisions within Google, where they will concentrate on the likes of YouTube, cloud services, and hardware. Now, the reason behind the changes is pretty simple. Access is said to no longer believe that installing Fiber is the best way to bring fast broadband connections to home across the US due to the high costs involved with deployment and maintenance. Instead, the company will now focus on developing new ways to expand its network without the need of fiber optic cables
Now, the company has made it clear that the changes do not mean a reduction in their current fiber reach and have also confirmed that new customers are still free to sign up to their service wherever it’s available. As the company stated back in October, it simply doesn’t have any current plans to further expands its network. Instead, all focus will be on alternative methods, most likely some form of wireless connections. Last year Access purchased Webpass, a company that specializes in transmitting broadband via small antennas, so it’s possible the company could work on ways to expand this, which would work well alongside Fiber’s current efforts to test wireless technologies.
Even though Alphabet’s Access is now a much smaller division with no plans of expansion, it’s fair to say that they have their priorities clearer than ever and, if everything goes to plan, the company may well be one of the first companies to deploy a new technology that can easily transmit broadband speeds without the need for all the cables. There are a couple of downsides, though, with the first being that the Google Fiber name itself indicates that it is a Fiber-centered service, something that could be misleading if the company decides to continue using the name for its future services. In addition to this, even if the company was to continue using the Google Fiber name, it will remain relatively unknown to the majority of consumers which could ultimately affect the company later on.