AT&T now operates more than 30 million fiber locations across the US.

The carrier revealed it had achieved the milestone earlier today (June 10), meaning it is halfway to its target of 60 million locations.

The announcement comes weeks after AT&T struck a deal to buy Lumen's mass market fiber business for $5.75 billion.

Prior to this deal, which AT&T expects to complete next year, the carrier's CEO John Stankey had expressed plans to reach more than 50 million fiber locations by 2029. That number increased by 10 million after the Lumen deal was announced.

Lumen's customer base includes one million fiber customers, and more than 4 million fiber locations across 11 states.

At present, AT&T has more than 8.5 million fiber customers of its own. The carrier is also adding fiber customers via its Gigapower fiber JV with investment company BlackRock.

Stankey said it was a "proud moment" for the company.

He said: “This accomplishment is a testament to our team’s hard work over many years to build the nation’s largest and fastest-growing fiber broadband network."

AT&T noted that between 2020 and last year, it had deployed thousands of miles of fiber optic infrastructure across the US, and invested more than $145 billion in its wireless and wireline networks. This has included capital investments and acquisitions of wireless spectrum.

To further support the company's fiber ambitions, last year AT&T struck four new agreements with commercial open-access providers to boost its fiber build. Those partners are Boldyn Networks, wholesale fiber developer and operator, Digital Infrastructure Group, PRIME FiBER, and Ubiquity.

Rival carriers Verizon and T-Mobile have also stepped up their respective fiber strategies in the last 12 months.

Last month, the Federal Communications Commission approved Verizon's $20 billion acquisition of fiber provider Frontier Communications. Frontier shareholders, despite many publicly rejecting the bid, agreed to approve the deal.

T-Mobile has also pushed the boat out on fiber, first through the acquisition of Lumos Networks as part of a joint venture (JV) with EQT Infrastructure in April of last year. Then, in July, the company agreed to set up a JV with investment firm KKR to acquire fiber Internet service provider Metronet.