Charlotte Stories is reporting that this week, Charlotte’s Britespeed closed on a $7.5 billion deal to acquire the network assets of Lumen Technologies across 20 states, positioning Brightspeed to become one of the largest incumbent local exchange carriers (ILEC) in the nation. They also recently commenced the construction of its state-of-the-art $2 billion fiber optics network, consisting of 1 million new fiber passings across 17 states. When completed, the new network will bring high-speed internet to more than 3 million homes and businesses.