July 13--With cable cord cutting and online video consumption on the rise, providing faster Internet speeds has become a high priority for Comcast, which now has more Internet customers than cable subscribers.
Comcast announced Monday that it is raising the speed of its Blast Internet service to 75 Mbps, at no additional charge. The 50 percent increase will benefit about half of the company's high-speed Internet customers in Chicago, effective immediately.
The company also announced a new "Extreme 150" Mbps service tier Monday for the Chicago region.
While the increases are already in place, customers may need to restart their modems to get fully up to speed. Comcast will notify those customers who need to upgrade their modems to get the increased service.
For customers who need more than "extreme" speeds, Comcast is also launching the previously announced Gigabit Pro service, which delivers 2 Gbps upload and download speeds. That is 4 times faster than the top Internet speeds previously offered in Chicago by Comcast. The service requires installation of professional grade equipment outside and inside the home, and costs about $299 per month, a big jump in price as well as speed.
The new 150 Mbps service retails for about $129 per month, while the Blast service is currently offered at about $40 per month, according to the company's website.
Comcast is also continuing to beef up mobile Internet service through its Wi-Fi hot spot initiative, which uses existing home modems to send out a separate, publicly accessible wireless network. The Comcast Wi-Fi network is approaching 900,000 hot spots in Chicago and has surpassed 8 million nationwide, John Crowley, Comcast's regional senior vice president, said in a statement.
As part of the shifting pay-TV paradigm, Comcast announced Sunday it is rolling out its own Internet streaming service to capture the growing number of viewers who bypass cable and watch TV online.
Comcast will offer Internet subscribers live online viewing of a dozen channels, including all major broadcast networks and HBO, for $15 per month. The service, called Stream, will launch in Boston at the end of the summer, followed by Chicago and Seattle.
In February, satellite provider Dish Network launched Sling TV, a streaming service that offers a basic package of some 20 cable channels for $20 per month, with HBO available for an additional $15.
rchannick@tribpub.com
