Canadian startup vows to out-fiber Google

A new Vancouver startup is promising Canadians blazing fast internet speeds for cheaper than Google’s comparable Kansas City fiber access. OneGigabit launched last week with fanfare, promising to offer one gigabit per second download speeds to apartments, condos, and office buildings for just $42 to $61 per month. That’s 60 times faster than the average connection speed in Canada.

OneGigabit is backed by two private investors who believe they can build up the nation’s high-speed fiber infrastructure by targeting real estate developers and building owners. The company says it is already building connections for a condo developer and a real estate company, and claims to be disrupting the “near-monopoly telecom incumbents in Canada.”

So can the tiny Canadian startup match Google’s offering? OneGigabit promises no bandwidth caps and is offering the service at a slightly cheaper price (Google’s is $70 per month). Other startups around the world have attempted to offer Google Fiber-level speeds, including Japan’s 2-gigabit service from Sony-owned So-net, but the service is still extremely rare. However, Google is expanding rapidly, with sights on Austin, Texas; Provo, Utah; and Shawnee, Kansas.