COVID-19 is Forcing the Upgrading of Broadband Infrastructure

As social distancing and teleworking arrangements grow across the country, the coronavirus pandemic is having an increasingly large impact on our online daily life. Everything from work meetings to social hours with friends, to data center training, are increasingly occurring online. All of the extra internet use is putting more pressure on the broadband infrastructure. As data demands rise, the surge is beginning to impact the quality and speed of content downloads. And as shelter-in-place directives increase, the question is whether the broadband infrastructure can support the new normal.

 

For a decade, it has been clear that the lack of affordable and abundant bandwidth would constrain economic growth. Fortunately, efforts emerged to improve that dynamic and are still working to accommodate the demands of remote learning, data center training, streaming entertainment, and mass teleworking. With the onset of COVID-19, we have learned three important factors about network deployments:

 

First - While many industrial processes increase in small, incremental steps, networks tend to improve through large transitions to next-generation technologies.

 

Second - Networks should be built for usage peaks, not averages, just like highways are built to accommodate rush hour traffic, not the 2 a.m. traffic.

 

Third - The true upside for society and the economy comes with the new applications that take advantage of increased speed and bandwidth.