The Window of Opportunity is closing rapidly.
"
Comcast selling a new service
Home Corp.'s Internet system links personal computers and cable TV.
By Tom Murphy
BLOOMBERG BUSINESS NEWS
BALTIMORE -- Comcast Corp. started selling Home Corp.'s high-speed Internet service in Baltimore, giving customers the
ability to tour local museums or browse the World Wide Web through personal computers linked to their cable TV system.
The system, which Comcast hopes eventually to offer in the Philadelphia area to compete with Bell Atlantic, delivers data
hundreds of times faster than traditional phone lines.
It's also about 75 times faster than ISDN, a competing data service offered by telephone companies.
The service will cost current subscribers $39.95 a month, about twice the cost of a telephone-based Internet service. There's
also a $175 installation fee, which Comcast has discounted to $95 for a limited time.
The new interactive service is offered in parts of Baltimore County where Comcast has installed fiber optic lines. Standard
cable service in that area costs $31.84 a month, including 60 channels.
The Home service offers local features, including 3-D multimedia tours of museums such as The Walters Art Gallery and online
access to Baltimore magazine.
It also provides unlimited access to the Internet.
Eventually, Comcast hopes to offer the service to about 500,000 customers in Baltimore and Howard Counties. It also plans to
offer the service during the first half of 1997 in some of its Philadelphia systems, and in Sarasota, Fla.; northern New Jersey;
suburban Detroit; and Orange County in Southern California.
Comcast, Cox Communications Inc. and the venture-capital fund Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers each own 14 percent of
Home. Tele-Communications Inc. owns 45 percent of the Mountain View, Calif.-based company.
The service was first offered by TCI in Fremont, Calif., during September. |
