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Technology Stocks : Concurrent Computer (CCUR) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Don Hand who wrote (14750)	11/26/2000 9:59:23 AM
From: Don Hand	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 21143

A brief third mention of CCUR in the AJC Business section in an article on the Western Trade show. Antec is mentioned also. Antec got hurt with AT&T's delay in receiving of shipments. CCUR is next to Antec at the trade show. Jack Bryant's former company is Antec. Once neglected customers the focus of cable TV industry gathering Kathy Brister - Staff Sunday, November 26, 2000 accessatlanta.com The people who'll get the most buzz at this week's cable industry conference in California won't even be there. Cable customers --- unlikely to cross the threshold of the Los Angeles Convention Center, home of this year's Western Show --- are at the core of just about every scheduled session on new technology, new products, new money-making strategies. Industry analysts will talk about customers being key. Federal Communications Commission staff will discuss consumers' roles in regulatory issues, among them opening cable lines to multiple Internet service providers. Last week, Time Warner Cable and Atlanta-based EarthLink struck a deal that will give Time Warner subscribers in some markets a choice of Internet service providers. Focusing on customers may not sound unusual. Customers are the lifeblood of every business. But the cable industry hasn't always looked at it that way. Its history of poor customer service is the stuff of legends. So why is cable concentrating on customers now? In a word, competition. Only in the last decade has the cable industry encountered it. Direct broadcast satellite and upstart terrestrial network cable companies called overbuilders are wooing pay TV customers who once had no choice but cable. Another reason this year's Western Show is customercentric is that long-promised interactive technology allowing cable companies to offer new services to customers is finally becoming a reality. "In the past, (the Western Show) has been kind of theoretical --- broadband is coming, interactive services are coming. Well, they're here. Now it's about the consumer," said Mike Goodman, who follows the cable industry for Boston-based research firm the Yankee Group. Cable companies see these new services --- high-speed Internet connections, cable telephone, video on demand --- as means for increasing revenue even if customer numbers stagnate or decline. Cable companies also think the new services will give them an edge on competitors and keep subscribers loyal. The cable companies and their equipment vendors no longer are asking if these technologies will work, Goodman said. "Now they're asking, 'How does the consumer use this hardware? How will we get it into consumer homes?' " Indeed, firms that sell to cable companies are planning much bigger Western Show splashes than cable operators themselves. Scientific-Atlanta is among several local companies attending the show. The Lawrenceville-based cable TV set-top box manufacturer is throwing a pizza party to show off interactive "set-toppings" on its latest digital box. It'll also be touting its role in burgeoning technologies, such as home networking. Duluth-based cable equipment maker Antec Corp. plans to announce some product enhancements and, for the first time, display Antec products and Arris Interactive products side by side, said Jim Bauer, head of investor relations for Antec. Antec recently announced plans to merge with Arris, a Suwanee-based cable telephone equipment maker in which Antec already had a stake. N2 Broadband, an interactive TV software maker in Duluth, and Internet broadcasting company Media1st.com of Atlanta plan to scour the Western Show floor for new customers. Video Networks Inc., a Roswell firm set to change its name to Pathfire in January, will be there also. Video Networks' technology allows media companies to move digital content, such as network news and commercials. Cobb County-based Weather Channel will be pitching its 24-hour weather updates. Concurrent Corp., a Duluth firm emerging as one of the leaders in video-on-demand servers, will unveil the latest version of its technology. Now that two-way, interactive cable services like video on demand and broadband are here, the industry will be looking ahead to the next innovation. According to industry experts, it'll be home networking --- connecting home computers, digital cable TV set-top boxes, perhaps even appliances and security systems through a single network. "Home networking is where broadband was two or three years ago," Goodman said. Cable companies are talking about the possibilities of cable-based home networks --- how to set them up, how to monitor them, how to make money from them, said John Mansell, a senior analyst with cable industry research firm Paul Kagan Associates Inc. Among Western Show panelists scheduled to speak on the subject is Dan Sweeney, general manger of home networking for Intel. The chip giant is working with cable set-top box makers, like Scientific-Atlanta, to turn digital set tops into home-networking nuclei. Sweeney said Intel is betting people want to control the technology in their home with one device. But while the technology is being developed, consumers need some education. "Consumers don't know they want a home network until they find out what one is," he said. AT A GLANCE > What: 2000 Western Show > Where: Los Angeles > When: Tuesday-Friday > Who: 31,000 cable and other technology industry employees, vendors and buyers