Good article, Denis. Caught it myself today on Yahoo. See dailynews.yahoo.com
Anyway, I think what I "heard" the other week about SBC's plans to create a separate leaseback facility is an effort, albeit questionable one by critics, to "distance" itself from the lessor of space at the RT. As stated in the following post, if the "RT Leasing Company" is to maximize ROI on the facility installed, market forces will dictate how space is allocated. See Message 13777782
Nevertheless, the article contains some key comments for discussion:
"The problem is that it moves the bottleneck from the central office out closer to the customer, and it's a lot easier [for competitors] to co-locate in the central office."
I couldn't agree more. Location of switches at the RT is going to require more risk on the part of CLECs in their deployment of their relatively scarce capital when reserving space at the RT vs the CO as the outgoing pairs are limited to the market of customers within the defined reach of the RT.
"The problem is, rival DSL carriers now compete with SBC using their own equipment located in central offices and must connect to customers over unbroken copper connections. Project Pronto's thousands of prebuilt cabinets break the direct copper connection and have no room for additional
equipment from other carriers."
This, IMHO, is the crux of the problem. Should SBC be compelled to allocate a defined amount of space for alternative CLEC cabinets? If so, shouldn't the CLEC's be ponying up for the huge investment SBC is undertaking? What obligation does SBC have under the FCC established conditions of the AIT merger?
The article states that "SBC agreed to offer DSL through a separate affiliate that would be treated no differently than other DSL providers. . . SBC realized that Project Pronto's prebuilt cabinets that integrate DSL equipment with old-fashioned phone service capabilities might violate the merger conditions. So SBC asked the FCC to let it own the cabinets and lease access to DSL providers, including its affiliate." This is essentially the news I heard.
So the primary question here is whether this leasing structure goes far enough in assuring CLECs competitive access to the RT. How will space be made available to accomodate potential CLEC demand at the RT? Is SBC really taking up all useable space at the outset? I dunno, but I would find that hard to believe.
"Project Pronto's thousands of prebuilt cabinets break the direct copper connection and have no room for additional equipment from other carriers."
Frank, could you please explain exactly what are the implication of "prebuilt cabinets?" Is the article implying that SBC is going to load up each RT with all their pre-built cabinets, and if the CLECs wish to lease space, they will have to lease space inside the cabinet, which may not be designed to work their switches at the CO? Or can one infer that space will be made available for a CLECs own cabinet? The statement "SBC contends that its rivals have at least two options. They can lease access to the complete DSL capability contained in the new cabinets, or build their own neighborhood networks" seems to imply the former, which I would agree with Covad, is not consistent with the spirit of the terms of the conditions to the AIT merger.
Mike (from Florida), how do these issues related to the the FCC regs on high speed data service that your intimately familiar with? Is SBC living up to the spirit of these regs? If so, then does the terms of the AIT merger go beyond these regs, as I think they might very well do?
"Marian Dyer, a Washington lobbyist for SBC, contends that forcing the company to create an open platform for competitors' equipment in the cabinets would drive up costs and delay the program for years. 'If you are truly going to get advanced services for all Americans like the Telecom Act requires, the only effective and cost-efficient way is a shared platform,' Dyer says. 'We are behind in this marketplace. We're in catch-up mode with cable modems, and they are unregulated.'
While some may frown at this defense, from my own backyard, it is certainly true. Cable modem deployment is moving swiftly throughout Los Angeles and should be available in the last of the cable-modemless franchise within 6 months to a year. Any slowdown in deployment of Pronto, will, to some degree, hurt SBC/PacBells efforts here in Los Angeles, an obvious competitive market for broadband access. Not only will DSL runup against the cable platform operated by incumbent MSOs, but also newly arrived overbuilders such as RCN.
Similar to the open access debate, there is an overriding FCC policy to encourage the quick deployment of broadband into the home. Again this policy runs counter to the longer term policy of competition along the last mile. The scales of "justice" once again will be called to task. In contrast to the open access debate, I hope that this "tension" does not find its way into the courts, or gets stuck in the administrative proceedings conducted by the FCC. Because if it does, it is the consumers, like the ones in Multnomah County, that will lose.
And they've suffered enough this evening at the hands of the LA Lakers. <ggg> |
