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Technology Stocks : PMC-Sierra (PMCS) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Billy Joe who wrote (2917)	10/16/1999 4:05:00 AM
From: John Farrell	Respond to of 3818

PMCS should be able to get a chunk of business from the merger of SBC Communications and Ameritech. SBC to offer high-speed Internet access $6 billion plan follows acquisition of Ameritech jsonline.com SBC to offer high-speed Internet access $6 billion plan follows acquisition of Ameritech Bloomberg News Last Updated: Oct. 15, 1999 San Antonio - SBC Communications Inc., which completed its acquisition of Ameritech Corp. in the past week, says it plans to spend $6 billion over the next three years to offer high-speed Internet access and other new services to customers in 13 states, including Wisconsin. "Project Pronto," as the initiative will be known, is expected to generate $3.5 billion in new revenue by 2004, the company said Friday. SBC, the largest U.S. local phone company, and other local phone companies are racing to sell high-speed Internet access and other services to consumers and businesses as demand soars. How this proposed build-out will affect the Milwaukee market is not clear. Before its deal with SBC, Ameritech had talked about, then balked at, building a high-speed network in metro Milwaukee. Ameritech provided local phone service in Wisconsin and four other Midwestern states as an independent company before it was bought by SBC. Time Warner Cable, which serves most of southeastern Wisconsin, has been beefing up its cable system to eventually include phone service. MCI Worldcom also has a partial network constructed in the Milwaukee market. SBC also is preparing to compete against AT&T Corp., the largest U.S. long-distance company, which has spent more than $100 billion to buy cable TV systems that it wants to use to offer local phone, Internet and other services. San Antonio-based SBC completed its $80.6 billion acquisition of Ameritech in the past week. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission approved the SBC-Ameritech union with conditions aimed at increasing competition in both companies' regions, including the stipulation that SBC enter 30 new markets in the next 30 months. The companies agreed to pay more than $1.2 billion in penalties if they fail to meet the conditions. With the 30 additional markets, SBC will serve two-thirds of the U.S. population. The new network will let SBC move voice calls from today's circuit-switched technology to cheaper, more efficient packet-switched technology. Breaking voice conversations into packets allows a network to carry more traffic. Circuit-switched conversations monopolize a communications channel and don't let other data travel through it, even if both parties on the line are silent. Lee Bergquist of the Journal Sentinel staff contributed to this report. Appeared in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on Oct. 16, 1999.