[Level 3's high tech game plan: Advanced switches will speed network]
From Denver Business Journal via Quote.com:
Level 3 Communications Inc. wants to become the first company to build a national telecommunications network from the ground up entirely based on Internet technology.
The Omaha-based scion of Peter Kiewit Sons' Inc. announced its intention to locate its headquarters in Denver, but has not made a final decision.
Wherever it lands, the company surely will find a fight in the fast and furious war to deliver faster, cheaper better telecommunications services to market.
"It's going to be the first network built from the ground up, end-to-end with Internet technology," said Josh Howell, executive vice president of the new company that promises to dramatically cut the cost of local and long distance telephone service and data transmission with a system that only uses Internet Protocol.
Howell likens the difference between Level 3's pure Internet Protocol network and the other traditional networks that rely on circuit switches to the evolution from old-fashioned telegraphs to modern telephones.
While both systems primarily rely on fiber optic networks, Internet Protocol makes more efficient use of bandwidth. The information, whether it be a conversation or a data stream, is broken into packets and sent individually along the best route before being reassembled at the other end.
"It's a much more efficient use of the pipe," Howell said. "That's why it's so much cheaper."
Though Level 3 boasts a $3 billion bankroll, the same leadership that built MFS Communications Co. and the benefits of starting with a blank canvas, it's unclear exactly what advantage if any it will have when the network is finished. Level 3 plans to complete infrastructure in its first cities this year and have the country wired by 1999.
"If we are not up and running in approximately six cities by the end of the year, we will be disappointed," Howell said.
But Denver-based Qwest Communications Inc. already is replacing the circuit switches in its unfinished network with the newer technology, and the company recently began offering voice transmissions using Internet Protocol.
"While their network is just mere speculation, we are leading the industry," said Nayel Shafi, Qwest's executive vice president, promising to hold an Irish wake for the death of circuit switches before Level 3 completes its network.
Others such as the Austin-based IXC Communications Inc. and Williams Cos. also are far along with fiber optic networks, prompting some to wonder what if any advantage Level 3 will have.
"There's nothing unique that I have heard about what they're doing," said Doug Hanson, CEO of Rocky Mountain Internet and former leader of Qwest. "I think the entire industry is headed in the Internet Protocol direction."
Level 3 has more in common with Qwest than just technology.
Jim Crowe, the widely respected CEO of Level 3, held a seat on Qwest's board until about a month ago, and Howell said the two companies may end up swapping services.
"It's not inconceivable that down the road the two of us will find a way to work together," he said. |
