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Technology Stocks : Terayon - S CDMA player (TERN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: George T. Santamaria who wrote (269)	2/10/2000 3:28:00 AM
From: Dan B.	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1658

George, I don't expect a "simple" internet connection will long be beyond the grasp of the "average consumer" as you suggest(if it is now). PC's are becoming more and more common. Hence, they are more and more understandable and understood. I understand the simplicity of a nice set-top box offering Cable Co. provided VOD, but given that I expect the internet itself to deliver such services, I can only say I don't expect folks to give up full internet access capabilities for some nice simple VOD/VCR buttons(though TERN does provide VOD capabilities). People will want to access the competition. Instead, I expect the average consumer to become more able even as available internet access devices become simpler(call it convergence, if you will-it's happening). When you say TERN is "throttling" customers down to 64kbps, I believe that is a strongly biased expression. Tern ADDS, at low implementation expense, services not otherwise available for sale without upgrades to HFC- and whatever the comparisons may be, this is a throttling UP to competitive offerings(read,current ISDN,T-1), at minimal costs. I've looked around a little bit at postings by Dave Horne(who originally informed me of the 64kbps minimum TERN offered speeds) on the CMTO thread. I intend to read further, but I gather your estimation of 2000 customers to a node has been declared too large. However, if you are correct, one can see capacity for 200 customers, each with dedicated 640kbps service for $400 per month per node. However many customers TERN can put to a node(to maintain QOS, much decreased by poor S/N levels, as I understand it), I gather that they could use the system simultaneously and still have the full 640kbps speed they paid for. That's QOS(quality of service). Here's the way Terayon puts it: "Maximize revenue-generating services: Quality of Service (QoS) controls allow operators to offer tiered services ranging from premium, guaranteed high-data-rate service for business and home office customers to more economical, best-effort Internet access for residential subscribers." terayon.com If(and I doubt it), TERN systems are only capable of filling a small niche market, it would seem that the R@D has been adequate to the extent that TERN growth is neck and neck(ahead at the moment) with CMTO. I remind myself here that I've seen no argument that would convinciningly indicate TERN s-cdma capablilities are at some technological dead-end beyond which they can't go- BWDIK, it's just common sense to this layman, who could be wrong. Also from the above link we find, in stark contrast to your claim that "...TERN is offering a very limited set of capabilities to the cable operator" and your purely guessing "doubt" as to what TERN can offer(I think you've confused the "broadband" internet aspects with the rest of their system), we find: "CherryPicker digital video management systems Deliver more services to subscribers: Operators can reach new markets by expanding beyond television to offer subscribers a host of revenue-generating services such as pay-per-view, high-speed Internet access, video-on-demand, datacasting, telephony and more." Until someone can document a bald faced lie in the above, it would seem you've significantly underestimated the "set of capabilities(tern offers) to the cable operator." If this weren't so, it would be difficult to explain even their acknowledged success to date. We all need to look further for answers, IMO. It is difficult to understand your statement that you are glad you didn't buy TERN 1.5 years ago given the wonderful returns you could have had to date. I can only guess that, believing TERN has far less to offer than it really does, it's a moral issue with you. Kudos on that, always. Still, I suspect your estimation of TERN is far short of reality, and I think their revenue growth likely reflects that far more than many realize just yet. Dan B