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Technology Stocks : Alphanet Telecom, WOW ! -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sushi who wrote (94)	7/30/1998 11:05:00 PM
From: wynn quon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 117

Has the technological risk disappeared? Only someone who has made a high volume of calls over the network can say for sure whether the network is commercial quality or not. The key technical obstacles would be assuring that packetization algorithms work well, that the network is effectively managed and that calls are billed correctly. And making sure that all of the above still work when call traffic ramps up. None of these tasks are impossible - in fact, there are several companies in the US now who have voice-over-IP networks up and running (e.g. IDT). Alphanet has pulled back from deploying voIP and has fallen back on using even older technology so the risks should be even less (unless their proprietary stuff has bugs). But it would be a mistake to get too hung up on the technology. The strongest challenges facing Alphanet Telecom are yet to come and they are not technological. Assume that Alphanet gets everything running and starts to pull in long-distance revenue - are the existing telecom carriers just going to sit back and let it happen? I see three tough roadblocks ahead. First, there may be legal challenges to force the company to take part in the settlements system that govern international long-distance. Second, the fall in long-distance rates will accelerate. The FCC in the US has moved to reduce the settlement payments and we will see drastically slimmer margins as time goes by. It will be harder to make a buck when long-distance calls become commoditized. Last but not least, the barriers to entry are low. If Alphanet can set up a network, then so can others. Off-the-shelf scalable VoIP gateways won't be long in coming and there is nothing to stop (guess who?) the large carriers from using them. The victor in this battle will likely be the giant telcos, not the little guys. It may not be particularly fair but that's business.

To: Sushi who wrote (94)	8/4/1998 9:42:00 AM
From: Sushi	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 117

AlphaNet Telecom Inc Directors approve $24.6-million financing Tuesday Aug 4 1998 Mr. Brian Wilson reports The board of directors has authorized an equity financing of approximately $24.6-million by the issuance of up to 1,540,000 special warrants at $16.00 per special warrant. Each warrant will be exercisable for one share of AlphaNet Telecom to be qualified under a planned prospectus filing by the company in all provinces of Canada. The company has appointed HSBC Securities as the exclusive agent for the issuance of the special warrants which will be offered on a private placement basis in Canada and the United States. The proceeds from this issue will be used to further expand the company's international telecommunications network. Since launching commercial service in November 1997, AlphaNet Telecom has experienced a steady build-up in international long distance traffic. On July 31, 1998, a new traffic milestone of 471,000 billed minutes for the day was achieved. This represented a more than fifty-fold increase in traffic volume from the first quarter of 1998 and an annualized run rate of approximately 170 million minutes. Forty carrier customers are currently under contract with the company. AlphaNet Telecom has points of presence in 12 countries worldwide and is in the process of adding an additional four countries that are anticipated to be operational by the end of August 1998. AlphaNet Telecom (TSE:FAX) Shares issued 8,363,780 1998-07-31 close $16.5