No post about this... i'll just break out the glue then an cut and past away.
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Excite@Home Plans DSL, Wireless Access
Excite@Home confirmed Friday that it plans to sell high-speed Internet access through digital subscriber line technology and over wireless platforms, expanding from the cable-based access it currently offers.
The company will offer DSL service over phone lines this year, Jacqueline Russo, an Excite@Home spokesperson, said in a telephone interview.
Excite@Home now has contracts with 22 cable operators, including AT&T and Cox Communications, to provide Internet access through cable modems to more than 1.1 million subscribers, Russo said.
However, most of those contracts are due to expire in 2002, leaving both Excite@Home and the cable operators free to seek other deals.
"We feel the franchise of our company is more than the sum of our contracts with cable companies," George Bell, Excite@Home's chief executive officer, reportedly told Dow Jones news service.
Excite@Home will not offer DSL service in areas where the company already has cable customers. "We are platform agnostic, but we will not pursue anything within our cable footprint," Russo said.
For wireless Internet access, Excite@Home and AT&T have already announced plans to distribute Excite@Home content through AT&T's PocketNet wireless data service, Russo said. The Excite portal will be a menu option on the PocketNet phone.
"Excite@Home is expanding into a broad array of services," said Jeannette Noyes, a research manager with Framingham, Massachusetts-based International Data Corporation. "It represents a fairly aggressive move for them."
Still, cable giants like AT&T and Time Warner continue to control the majority of the Internet networks, Noyes cautioned. She noted that Excite@Home said it wants to increase its subscriber base to 2.5 million customers in a year. "That's not going to change the world overnight," Noyes said.
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