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To: riposte who wrote (30041)	12/17/1997 7:35:00 PM
From: marc friedman	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 31386

TO PAT M THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR THE REFERENCE ON THE TENDER INFO.THEY ANSWERED ALL MY QUESTIONS. SINCERELY MARC FRIEDMAN

To: riposte who wrote (30041)	12/17/1997 7:50:00 PM
From: pat mudge	Respond to of 31386

[Metcalf] <<<I suspect another agenda because of his complete dismissal of ADSL, without providing any discussion or details to back up his conclusion. There have been many trials, and they seem to be successful - could they all be wrong?>>> Steve -- Is he still associated with COMS? If so, it would explain his interest in delaying ADSL in favor of 56K. Reality be damned. <g> Pat

To: riposte who wrote (30041)	12/17/1997 9:54:00 PM
From: Twisted Pair	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 31386

[Steve: Re: Metcalf] <I suspect another agenda because of his complete dismissal of ADSL, without providing any discussion or details to back up his conclusion.> I agree, he did not qualify his statement. OTOH, he was an early ADSL cheerleader. I guess he just ran out of patience. I haven't reviewed the ADSL trials in a few months, but last time I looked they were going ok. BA had a successful xDSL trial in Northern Virginia in 1996. I believe his frustration is at least partly due to the slooowww xDSL deployment by the telcos. I participated in a lively prolonged email about this w/ management at work. As much as I believe in AMTX I think it was a long shot that AMTX would get a RBOC contract unless they partnered w/ a large established co. I suspect after sales vendor support is a big issue w/ the telcos and a start-up co. may not have much to offer when it comes to after sales support. Technology is evolving at such a rapid pace and the telcos just keep plodding along. Being bought out for $20.00/share is not the ending I expected for AMTX <Just thinking out loud...> Well, at least you don't suffer from the dreaded episodic foot-in-mouth disease like I do... :-) Mike

To: riposte who wrote (30041)	12/17/1997 11:48:00 PM
From: Chemsync	Respond to of 31386

[Is DSL DOA?] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- NO WAY says Fred McClimas Fred McClimans is CEO of Current Analysis, Inc., which offers online competitive intelligence and analytical services. You can link to www.currentwire.com or reach Fred at fred@ currentanalysis. com Over the past month I've had several people tell me they think DSL is becoming a technology without a future - there are few vendors and they don't have much to show in the way of revenue or market penetration. ''What went wrong?'' they asked. The answer isn't simple. But DSL is far from dead. In fact, its biggest problem right now is all the naysayers willing to write off a technology before it even gets a chance to stand on the launch pad. DSL made steady progress in 1997. Sure, DSL sales remain low, but it brought in a ton of startup money - venture capitalists poured even more money into DSL technologies than they did in 1996 (and there was certainly no lack of DSL hype). It's just that DSL didn't move at a furious enough pace for some people. Where networking once moved to the rhythms of multi-year cycles, it is increasingly fixated on the fad of the moment. DSL didn't work last month? It's through! I recently saw a presentation that declared DSL "out" for 1998, in part because of a significant reduction in project venture-capital funding of DSL. But is this VC slowdown really a sign of a dead technology? No. It actually shows the technology is growing up. It would be more surprising to see continued cash infusions for new startups when the existing ones are just about to unleash their wares in the open market. It's the same pattern we saw in ATM and Gigabit Ethernet. Both began with lots of startups and lots of venture money. Then things settled down and eventually the startups started getting acquired. This is an important point since I firmly believe that the major winners in this market over the next 5 years will likely not include many (or perhaps any) of the small startups emerging today. DSL is an infrastructure technology moving into an established market (i.e., the market now served by such technologies as frame relay and T-1 leased lines). To compete successfully, DSL vendors will have to develop products that not only work but have decent management tools - and then get themselves acquired by larger companies with established support and distribution channels in the ''access infrastructure'' market. Think of Ascend, Cisco, Pulsecom and ADC. Yes, there are still technological challenges ahead for DSL. We have yet to see real standardization and interoperability among different vendors - critical for any user with a decent sized infrastructure. However, we should see this largely fixed by the end of 1998. Also, competitive local exchange carriers and ISPs must seriously push DSL as a lower-cost alternative to traditional T-1 service - the technology simply won't take off if there are no networks for users to connect to. Ultimately, DSL should be transparent to the user - who should be focusing on questions of cost, data rates and measuring service levels (unfortunately, we have become a fractured market where users often attempt to sort out whether or not they should be using a particular technology - such as Frame Relay, or ATM, or T1 - when they ultimately should be evaluating the service characteristics). Finally, DSL simply needs more time to prove itself - for the new products to be tested and service offerings to be trialed. This means a period of lengthy trials during which the providers figure out how best to use this infrastructural technology. Issues such as distance limitations must be addressed through both technology and services (how can the service be offered within the constraints of the technology?). But this will happen, although perhaps not quite in an ''Internet year.'' DSL will eventually displace much of the T-1 gear long-term, but this will take a while since T-1 service has been a commodity market for some time and service providers are generally reluctant to enter into massive new expenditures unless there is a clear-cut problem (which there is not - yet). As older product is eased out of the network, expect new ''hybrid'' multi-service access devices - capable of supporting an interesting mix of technologies such as DSL, Frame Relay, ATM and T-1. So while there is as yet no billion-dollar DSL market, it's still very much alive and well. For users, its arrival means they should begin pushing their service providers (CLEC, RBOC, ISP or NSP) for lower-priced services with increased flexibility in terms of data rates, service level agreements and billing options. This is what will make the DSL market appear sooner rather than later.