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Technology Stocks : NorthPoint Communications Holdings, Inc. (NPNT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: fiberman who wrote (499)	1/21/2000 7:51:00 PM
From: Jonathan Boyd	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 786

I came across this article in Red Herring from November. It may be of interest to the thread. Jon ========== NORTHPOINT COMM. Nasdaq: NPNT An awesome opportunity. You have to love a near-billionaire CEO who lives in the same studio apartment he had when his company was barely off the ground. Michael Malaga, CEO of NorthPoint Communications, a competitive local-exchange carrier of digital subscriber line (DSL) services, still hasn't traded up, even though his company sports a $3 billion valuation. With NorthPoint trading at August prices of around $25 a share, smart investors might want to pick up this stock before Mr. Malaga picks up bigger digs. Poised to complete a 28-city rollout of DSL service, NorthPoint has attracted big backers, including Intel (Nasdaq: INTC), Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT), Tandy (NYSE: TAN), Verio (Nasdaq: VRIO), and Vulcan Ventures. NorthPoint is betting that small- and midsize-business owners will prefer the lower cost and easier installation of copper phone lines to cable access. But many of those business owners couldn't sign up with NorthPoint now. Failing to achieve speedy rollouts, DSL providers have dropped behind cable companies in the race for broadband customers. Why? Aside from the fact that each metropolitan center requires some 40 switching centers that cost roughly $125,000 apiece, both the land to build on and qualified installation personnel have been more scarce than expected. So early investors will need patience. To wit: the stock fell nearly 50 percent off its June highs of $48.75 after lower-than-expected subscriber growth in the company's second quarter forced analysts to lower forecasts of subscriber additions for the year. But patience should pay off. Analysts believe NorthPoint will be the first of the top three pure-play DSL companies (the others are Rhythms NetConnections (NYSE: RTHM) and Covad (Nasdaq: COVD) to realize its market potential. NorthPoint leads in installations, serving 25 U.S. markets by July, compared to Rhythm's 17 and Covad's 16. What's more, NorthPoint claims that partnerships with 170 Internet service providers give it the largest footprint of any DSL provider. "The opportunities for NorthPoint are awesome," says Goldman Sachs (NYSE: GS) analyst Ken Hoexter. Opportunities sweetened by a possible buyout: a partnership with AT&T (NYSE: T) is in the works, and acquisition is in the air. When asked, Mr. Malaga was mum on the issue, and Mr. Hoexter said, "I won't go there." (Not surprising from a NorthPoint investment banker and an underwriter of its IPO.) But John Doughty, communications analyst with Credit Suisse First Boston, isn't so reticent: "It wouldn't surprise me to see all three DSL companies get acquired down the road." Short of that, his target price of $60 is more than double today's levels.