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Technology Stocks : Ascend Communications (ASND) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: James A. Venooker who wrote (53909)	9/8/1998 10:56:00 PM
From: Dee Jay	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 61433

I'm sure I read the same article but came to vastly different conclusions, James...they bought SRA primarily because of SS7 because without it there aren't the valued-added features such as Caller ID and the billing systems available to VOIP. Please note that the CLECs are Ascend's primary targets, not the RBOCs although they will not ignore the Regional Bells. The CLECs are much faster to respond and will run circles around the stodgy RBOCs but in order to offer value-added services along with Voice over IP they need what SS7 offers and that's why SS7 is going to be integrated into Ascend's product lines. SRA's voice products were the reason for the acquisition and the other lines, grouped into other divisions, are going to be sold off. As to Mory coming close to saying LU will take over Ascend, all he said was they want to remain independent but in the final analysis the board and shareholders have interests that must be considered. It was a non-answer answer and the only thing he could say without being specific. If he were to say no to the idea of LU buying them that would hurt the stock; conversely to say that they're eager to be bought out by LU or anyone else also would be unwise. He gave the best possible non-committal answer available to him. Reading between the lines is risky at best, IMHO. Dee Jay