The Giant price slasher is at it again. When it started to offer sub $1000 flat panel TV’s, many of its largest competitors ended up having to close stores and layoff employees. What will happen with its latest venture and what impact will that have on other broadband providers remains to be seen.

Broadband sellers, beware. A new provider is on the scene—and it’s a known price cutter. Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) plans to announce Oct. 9 that it will resell high-speed Internet access from Hughes Communications (HUGH), the world’s largest provider of broadband services via satellite.

Granted, the market for satellite broadband is small, given the widespread availability of digital subscriber line access from phone companies and cable modem services from cable operators. Currently, satellite service tends to be more expensive and it’s available mainly in hard-to-reach rural areas. Fewer than 500,000 Americans subscribe to satellite broadband access, according to consultancy Parks Associates. “It’s still mainly for people who don’t have a choice,” says Michael Cai, an analyst at Parks. Only about 10% of Americans have no access to DSL or cable broadband.

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The United States may be the world’s largest economy, but when it comes to Internet connections at home, many Americans still live in the slow lane. By contrast, Japan is a broadband paradise with the fastest and cheapest Internet connections in the world.

Nearly eight million Japanese have a fiber optic line at home that is as much as 30 times speedier than a typical DSL line.

But while that speed is a boon for Japanese users, industry analysts and some companies question whether the push to install fiber is worth the effort, given the high cost of installation, affordable alternatives and lack of services that take advantage of the fast connections.

Indeed, the stock price of Nippon Telegraph and Telephone, which has two-thirds of the fiber-to-the-home market, has sunk because of concerns about heavy investments and the deep discounts it has showered on customers. Other carriers have gotten out of the business entirely, even though it is supported by government tax breaks and other incentives.

The heavy spending on fiber networks, analysts say, is typical in Japan, where big companies disregard short-term profit and plow billions into projects in the belief that something good will necessarily follow.

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