AT&T's Data Strategy in conjunction with TCI to offer cable, data, and voice packaging.
September 19, 1998
AT&T Outlines Data Strategy
Washington -- AT&T Corp. is preparing an aggressive cable-, data- and voice-packaging strategy in conjunction with its planned acquisition of Tele-Communications Inc., including free access to Web sites via the set-top box.
Dan Shulman, president of AT&T's Worldnet data-services unit, outlined his company's thinking about how it will bundle services as it moves to an ever more IP-centric (Internet protocol) paradigm that will eventually include voice and some TV services, as well as Internet data.
"IP is absolutely mission-critical to the future of AT&T," Shulman said at the Voice on the Net conference here. "We're transitioning everything that we do to the IP infrastructure."
In addition, AT&T Consumer Services, the unit that will run what is now TCI's cable operation, will offer a higher-speed, 128-kilobit-per-second Internet-access service at costs comparable to the $20 per month that Internet-service providers currently charge for dial-up access, he said.
These data-service tiers will be in addition to a higher-priced high-speed-data service like the one that @Home Network currently offers over hybrid fiber-coaxial networks, Shulman noted.
- 9/18/98 |
