The age of traditional cable TV and telephone service is ending. Is broadband next?

Traditional cable television and telephone service is quickly fading away. They both saw vibrant growth for decades. In the 1990s, they hit their peak, starting to sell extra phone lines, so customers could dial-up for internet connection with AOL and Prodigy. Smaller cable TV companies started to consolidate into giants.

Then things changed quickly. Today, if we pull the camera back, we can get a longer-term, historical perspective of the changes which are rewriting these industries and the world around us. Even 10 years ago, most didn’t understand the profound changes these industries were beginning.

It was roughly when AT&T and Verizon started their transformational trek. You remember when AT&T acquired DirecTV, Time Warner Media, Warner Media, CNN and Warner Brothers Studio. Or when Verizon acquired AOL and Yahoo.

As it turned out, after several years of trying, these were big mistakes. Apparently, they were made before the executive management of these companies could see the writing on the wall for what was coming.

Over two decades traditional telephone service and cable TV continued to lose market share. Consider cable TV. We think of giants like Comcast Xfinity, Charter Spectrum, Altice, Cox and more. However, there are also plenty of smaller competitors as well.

While cable TV subscribers leave to use other services and other competitors, this once vibrant cash-cow is now struggling. In fact, smaller providers are already starting to move away from TV and focusing on broadband.

Let’s take a look at what’s comes next. The growth opportunities and the challenges.

Broadband is next battleground with FWA and 5G wireless

Not only are yesterdays, traditional services continuing to lose market share, but now a new threat is appearing. We are in the early stages of a new battleground starting up in the broadband market. Today, wireline broadband from cable TV and telephone companies is starting to be threatened by FWA, which enables wireless providers to offer home wireless broadband.

In the past, cable TV and telephone companies never had to worry about losing market share. That tragically meant they didn’t care about the customer. Today, the damaged relationship they created has turned around and is now biting them. Their customers have little or no loyalty and are are moving to other technologies and in many cases, other competitors.

This is an important lesson for every company who faces competition and innovation in technology. If you don’t care about your customers, your customers will not care about you. Ultimately, the time will come, and you will be hurt with lost market share.

While cable TV companies offer wireline broadband service, suddenly the wireless companies are entering the playing field with a new, lower cost wireless broadband service. That means this is a new competitive battleground and it is just getting started.

FWA is both good and bad. FWA is a threat to the cable television competitors like Comcast Xfinity, Charter Spectrum, Altice Optimum, Cox and more. But FWA and wireless broadband is good news for wireless carriers like AT&T , T-Mobile TMUS , Verizon VZ and even many smaller wireless resellers.

So, cable TV companies need to find another solution to this growing threat to their broadband business or it will continue to lose customers as traditional cable TV is doing.

Wireless broadband innovations for cable

Last week a new company called Air5 announced they have a solution for the cable television companies with their broadband dilemma. Their technology brings 5G wireless into the picture. They let cable TV companies blend 5G wireless broadband with their wireline broadband.

If this works as advertised, it could give the cable TV competitors just what they need to battle with wireless providers with FWA. Remember, FWA which creates wireless home broadband services is brand new. That means there are new problems which will pop up which need to be resolved.

Another problem faced by wireless companies is FWA capacity. US Cellular has found there is not enough FWA capacity, causing issues. Tarana Wireless is working with US Cellular to solve these FWA capacity problems. If this works, this could help them all over the country. Plus, it could also help other wireless carriers.

What was hot yesterday is cool today and is replaced

So, as you can see, everything keeps changing and moving forward. New products, new technologies and new companies keep entering the marketplace.

This impacts traditional services. The growth-wave rises, crests and falls and is replaced by new products and services on their own growth curve. That is an opportunity and a threat for investors, companies and customers.

So, the growth wave for cable TV and telephone companies has grown, then crested and is now falling, and pretty quickly at that.

Plus, what happens with cable TV, telephone and wireless companies will impact many other industries. Think about TV, movies, streaming TV, social media and so much more which reach their customers over these services.

Expect these and other new ideas entering the marketplace to change things. I will discuss them as I discover them. So, keep your eyes open. New technology and new competitors are changing the services we all grew up with.

Tomorrow looks much different. Understanding this and being early to market gives companies and investors a first-mover advantage.

Read more: The next telecom and wireless growth wave is overdue