Broadband providers spend enormous time and capital optimizing their network expansion plans. Network designs are refined, construction costs are scrutinized, and deployment schedules are constantly adjusted to improve efficiency. Yet one of the most persistent sources of waste in broadband infrastructure projects rarely appears in capital reviews or post-build analyses.
It begins much earlier, with a seemingly small problem: inaccurate location data.
Across the industry, discrepancies as high as 20% between assumed and actual serviceable locations is common. On paper, this feels immaterial. In practice, it cascades through every phase of a broadband project, quietly inflating costs, draining labor productivity, weakening revenue outcomes, and undermining the probability of meeting sales targets. Because the waste is distributed across teams and timelines, it often goes unrecognized.
This is one of the most preventable sources of inefficiency in broadband today.
Broadband planning depends on accurate counts of where people live, work, and connect. When those counts are off, every downstream decision inherits the error.
~The misalignment may stem from missing addresses, duplicate records, double counting because of slight spelling variations, misclassified structures, or incorrect unit counts in multi-dwelling buildings. While each issue appears minor on its own, the financial impact compounds as projects move from planning to construction to go-to-market.
The result is waste that shows up in many forms but is rarely traced back to its root cause.
One of the most immediate impacts of inaccurate location data is lost labor time. Engineering and construction teams routinely conduct field visits to verify addresses that turn out to be nonexistent, mislabeled, or already served.
These inefficiencies show up as:
Individually, these hours seem insignificant. Multiplied across markets, crews, and months, they represent a material drain on productivity. Because the costs are buried in operational budgets rather than capital line items, they are rarely attributed to location data quality.
Location misalignment also inflates construction budgets in subtle but damaging ways. When planners overestimate the number of serviceable locations, cost-per-location metrics appear lower than they truly are. Conversely, when high-cost locations are mixed with low-cost ones under generic assumptions, capital is misallocated.
Common consequences include:
These errors undermine confidence in business cases and contribute to the growing gap between projected and realized returns.
The impact of poor location data does not end with construction. Sales and marketing teams inherit the same flawed assumptions.
Campaigns are launched into areas where:
At the same time, some serviceable locations already within the footprint are never marketed to at all. This creates a paradox where providers simultaneously overspend on marketing while leaving revenue untapped.
From a financial perspective, this is not simply inefficiency. It is missed opportunity compounded by unnecessary expense.
One reason this problem persists is that responsibility for location data is fragmented. Engineering, construction, finance, sales, and regulatory teams each touch location data differently, often using separate sources, systems and definitions.
As a result:
This often appears as “execution risk” rather than a systemic data issue.
The good news is that this form of waste is highly addressable. Advances in AI-driven location intelligence and multi-source data validation now make it possible to identify and correct misalignments early in the planning cycle.
When providers invest in higher-integrity location data, they gain:
Even modest improvements in accuracy can yield outsized financial returns by removing inefficiencies that ripple across the project lifecycle.
The broadband industry has long measured efficiency through construction speed and cost per passing. Location intelligence has always been part of that equation, informing where networks are built and how investments are prioritized. These metrics still matter, but they do not tell the whole story.
A more complete view begins with a different question: how much waste is introduced before the first shovel ever hits the ground?
In many cases, the answer traces back to inaccurate or incomplete location data. When the underlying view of serviceable locations is misaligned with reality, inefficiencies are built into plans from the outset. Addressing this does not require rethinking how networks are constructed. The real opportunity lies in improving the accuracy of location data before planning begins, so inefficiencies are not baked into the project from day one.
In a capital-constrained environment, reducing waste is often more achievable than driving new growth. The unseen waste caused by inaccurate location data represents one of the industry’s largest and least controversial opportunities to improve performance.
By improving accuracy at the front end, broadband providers can reduce labor waste, control construction budgets, and focus marketing efforts where they will deliver real returns.
In an industry where margins are tightening and accountability is rising, precision is no longer a luxury. It is one of the most effective tools available to protect and improve ROI.