While consumers often clamor for faster broadband to address streaming or web surfing needs, service providers around the globe are racing to provide faster broadband to fuel economic growth, increase global competitiveness and bolster pioneering development. We invite you to join our#CiscoChat on Wednesday, May 13 from 9 to 10 a.m. PST to discuss this and much more.

In 2013, former FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski issued a "Gigabit City Challenge" calling on cable operators, telcos and ISPs to lead the world into the "Gigabit Era." As a part of this challenge, Genachowski appealed to civic leaders to assist broadband providers in accelerating the development of gigabit communities, where innovation hubscould flourish and new business and industries could emerge. Looking toward the future, Genachowski hoped the Gigabit City Challenge would result in at least one Gigabit community in each state by 2015.

While the country has not quite hit this goal just yet, progress has been made. At Cisco, we've remained committed to helping our customers deliver the fastest internet in the world. When designing our next-generation cable product, we designed it to handle massive bandwidth, delivered cost-effectively, with rapid time to market. The industry's first evolved CCAP, cBR-8, offers ten times the speed and capacity of any CCAP available today.

So, what's behind the urgent need for a super-fast and high-capacity broadband networks? For starters, the growth of the Internet of Everything (IoE) and all of the connected devices on it. From interactive sporting events to immersive shopping experiences, IoE continues to change everything about how we connect to and engage with the world around us. To handle this influx of devices; the demands and expectations of consumers; and the innovation necessary for job creation, economic growth, and market competitiveness -we need gigabit communities.

Now that we know the type of broadband development we need, how do we prepare our networks? And just how much will the loss of broadband markettrulycost us, both in jobs and competitiveness with other countries whose infrastructure rivals -or even surpasses ours? During our next#CiscoChat on May 13, we'll seek to answer these questions -and invite you to share your thoughts and solutions with us.

Joined by John Chapman, Cisco Engineering Fellow; Todd McCrum, Cisco's Director of Product Management; Leslie Ellis top technology industry journalist, and moderated by our own Sara Cicero (@stutz24s), we'll talk gigabit community successes, how ISPs and cable operators can work with government leaders to create gigabit communities, obstacles to the Gigabit era, and much more.

Join the conversation Wednesday, May 13 from 9 to 10 a.m. PST using the hashtag#CiscoChat. From 9-9:30 a.m., we will be holding the#CiscoChat via Periscope. Download the app. on iTunes or Android to view. If tuning in via desktop, click on the link provided by the @CiscoSP360 Twitter account. The discussion will continue on Twitter from 9:30-10 a.m. on Twitter.

Share your thoughts, engage with our executives, comment or give us hearts on Periscope! We would love to hear from our socially engaged audience.