Sure, consumers are fleeing cable TV packages. But they’re pouring into broadband.

Judging solely by the angst-ridden headlines, big cable television providers have been on borrowed time for years. Their core business of delivering multichannel TV content is faltering as viewers flock to streaming services and internet video creators, which pump shows, movies and live broadcasts into their homes at comparatively lower prices. Many investors have feared that big cable players could become relics — simply too sclerotic and beholden to their eroding business models to adapt.

In one sense, they are right. In recent years, cable has steadily ceded market share to companies such as Netflix and Alphabet, the parent company of YouTube. But cable companies have proved themselves to be far more adaptable than predicted.

With consumers demanding more digital bandwidth and faster download speeds to accommodate their new habits, cable companies have tapped their existing networks for a new purpose: providing high-powered internet. Today, these companies have largely become internet service providers (ISPs) that also happen to have legacy video services.

In some ways, the cable companies’ biggest advantage in this new era is the most basic: the actual cable lines that crisscross scores of U.S. neighborhoods. These lines took years to build out, but they are relatively inexpensive to expand and maintain, and can be scaled up to meet changing consumer demands.

This new focus has brought a new set of competitors. Today, cable ISPs primarily compete against fixed wireless and fiber optic options rather than services that provide movies and shows. Some market watchers think wireless and fiber optic businesses have advantages over cable. But I don’t think that will be the case, at least not in the next several years, because of the newcomers’ technical and cost constraints. Instead, I believe cable companies are well positioned.

Of course, there are potential snags. In the near term, fixed wireless has a lot of room to expand, and I anticipate that it will gain market share in the next year or two. There’s an outside chance of a technological breakthrough that makes one of the competing technologies far more effective. And the declining video business could weigh on cable companies’ results.

But I think those potential downsides pale next to the expected upside over the next three to five years. I believe cable ISPs are poised for significant growth in that time.

Cable’s media past gave it the keys to a networked present.

For many years, TV watchers could pick from three providers: cable, satellite and broadcast. For many, it wasn’t really a choice. Satellite was often prohibitively expensive, while broadcast was spotty, grainy and limited to a handful of networks. Cable provided a crisp picture and dozens (if not hundreds) of channels. As a result, the cable companies expanded their networks throughout the 1980s and ’90s, well before the advent of widespread highspeed internet.

That early success played into the eventual decline of their video business, however. The companies quickly gained a reputation for monopolistic practices and constant price increases; when other streaming services gave consumers the opportunity to bolt, they took it.

The bright side? Coaxial, the insulated copper wiring that delivers cable’s signal, is a flexible and inexpensive technology. Its high data capacity and signal fidelity were good for delivering television, but those traits also make it a strong contender for delivering the internet. And because the networks are only a few decades old, they tend to be much easier to update and maintain than some other networks. Legacy dangers that have plagued older telecoms, like the lead-lined copper cables laid in the late 1800s, aren’t an issue for cable companies.

With its new direction, cable has new competitors — but those rivals face long-term hurdles.

Today, cable’s ISP business primarily competes with fixed wireless and fiber optic networks. Fixed wireless is a relatively new application of existing wireless communications technology that allows users to connect to the internet through broadcast towers. Fiber optic uses delicate, ultraclear wires to transmit information at incredible speed.

Both systems have upsides and attractive qualities. However, I think they also have hurdles that will hinder their efforts to unseat cable networks.

For example, fixed wireless provides over-the-air internet access, similar to cellphone systems. It’s a fast-growing technology that will likely take some market share from cable ISPs over the next year or two. However, it faces a critical technical limitation: Airwaves can carry only so much data at any one moment. It’s similar to a radio, with every user being a little two-way station. Just as radio stations will overlap one another if they’re packed in too tightly, fixed wireless users can crowd out the system if too many people use the same tower at once.

That limitation is just a physical reality of airwaves. There are ways to alleviate it, and better technology might use the available bandwidth more efficiently. But right now, fixed wireless simply can’t scale to match local demands the way a cabled system can.

Alternatively, fiber optic is a truly powerful technology. It’s lightning-fast, transferring data near the speed of light, making it a must-have for some tech users. However, that comes at a price: The cabling is delicate and difficult to install, as it’s made from threads of glass or plastic that must be free from imperfections and impurities. In real-world terms, this leads to longer and more expensive network expansion. We've already seen how this cost differential plays out, with cable expanding much more consistently; fiber optic networks overlap only 40% of cable networks, despite both technologies existing for decades.

That is likely to be even more relevant as the U.S. pushes to build out quality internet access in rural areas. With bipartisan legislation helping to fund network expansion into these regions, cable looks best poised to benefit, due to its cost effectiveness and flexibility.

Overall, I think cable has firmly demonstrated that it’s part of the 21st-century technology landscape, and it’s a credit to the industry and its leaders that they’ve been able to pivot so effectively. As they move into this next act, I’m optimistic about how the story will play out.