The latest telecom news includes announcements from Ritter Communications, Great Plains Communications, Rightfiber, XKL, Wi-Fi 7, and others.
Rightfiber Launches With $1.6 Billion Credit Facility and 28,000-Mile Fiber Network
Grain Management has completed the combination of Ritter Communications and Great Plains Communications to create Rightfiber, one of the largest privately held fiber-broadband platforms in the United States. The new company serves more than 400 communities across 20 states and operates a 28,000-mile fiber network with more than 300,000 fiber-to-the-home passings. Rightfiber has also secured a $1.6 billion credit facility led by Fifth Third Bank to support organic network expansion and potential acquisitions. The company serves residential users, enterprises, carriers and hyperscalers. The transaction gives Rightfiber greater scale for broadband investment and fiber expansion while combining two operators with more than a century of operating history each.
XKL Starts Shipping 100G/400G Optical Transport Systems for Carrier Network Expansion
XKL has begun global shipments of its MediaLight Xponder and MediaLight Muxponder optical-transport platforms, targeting regional service providers, enterprise networks and cloud-connectivity deployments. The compact 1RU systems support 100G and 400G transport and provide 24 license-free QSFP-DD/QSFP28 ports. XKL says the equipment delivers sub-5-microsecond latency and can operate over existing dark fiber or third-party open line systems through alien-wavelength interoperability. The products are aimed at operators facing rising bandwidth requirements and long equipment lead times, particularly for backhaul, middle-mile, AI interconnect and data-center interconnection. XKL is also eliminating recurring software-license charges, positioning MediaLight as a lower-complexity alternative for carriers expanding optical capacity without replacing existing DWDM infrastructure.
Wi-Fi 7 Captures More Than Half of WLAN Market as AP Shipments Hit Record
Wi-Fi 7 accounted for more than 50 percent of enterprise WLAN sales in Q2 2026, according to Dell’Oro Group, highlighting rapid migration toward higher-capacity wireless infrastructure. Vendors shipped more than 10 billion access points during the quarter, an industry record, while the WLAN market recorded double-digit growth across every region. Shipments of access points equipped with multi-gigabit and 10 Gbps interfaces also reached record levels. Dell’Oro expects Wi-Fi 7 adoption to continue increasing through 2028, while initial Wi-Fi 8 revenue could emerge in 2027. Equipment prices are expected to rise because of persistent memory-component shortages. Outdoor access-point revenue has outperformed the broader WLAN market in 7 of the past 8 quarters, reflecting continued enterprise and campus-network investment.