Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Technology Stocks : Visual Data (VDAT) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: prgraphics who wrote (164)	4/5/1999 6:43:00 AM
From: nord	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 405

From xdsl news letter A Week of Colossal Shifts Last week¹s announcement from SBC was to the telecommunications industry what a 7.5 point earthquake is to California: a huge shift! However, unlike an earthquake, this shift may be just what the market asked for. And that announcement was only the first in a major week of telecommunications activity. Let¹s take a look at the events of the past week: - First things first. On Tuesday, we had simultaneous announcements from Pacific Bell (a subsidiary of SBC Communications), Southwestern Bell (of SBC Communications), and SNET (another of SBC¹s underlings). Pacific Bell is slashing ADSL prices to $49 per month (including Internet service) for guaranteed minimum speeds of 384 Kbps. Southwestern Bell is planning to offer a similar offer (at $49 per month) to its five-state market area pending FCC approval. And SNET will trial ADSL in Connecticut prior to a full launch. The grand plan is for SBC Communications to make ADSL available to 8.2 million residential customers and 1.3 million business customers by the end of the year. SBC appears to want to rule the world (the DSL world, anyway). - The next day, we had an interesting announcement from HISAC (the High Speed Access Coalition) claiming victory (responsibility?) for the Pacific Bell announcement. What? - Also on Wednesday, Lucent announced that it had signed an agreement to merge with Ascend Communications. - Not to be outdone, America Online and Bell Atlantic announced plans to offer ADSL for AOL service starting ³this summer². Along with this announcement, Bell Atlantic says they plan to make ADSL available to 7.5 million homes by the end of 1999. (They expect that number to almost double by year-end 2000.) The AOL price will be ³less than $20 extra per month². (Did someone say ³$49²?) - In another post-SBC announcement fallout action, Flashcom announced a ³dramatic reduction in the price² of DSL service in California, Massachusetts, Washington, New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, Illinois, Michigan, New Hampshire, Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. The aftershocks had officially begun. - How about another? On Friday, Orconet blatantly announced that it is reducing its DSL pricing as a result of the Pacific Bell offer. Orconet markets ADSL in California and states that they support what SBC is doing to shift the market, because this will make their customers happy (because they can afford to offer reduced pricing). Expect more fallout from the SBC announcements to come. There will be price matching all over the place. And, because we¹re already hearing grumbling about SBC¹s practices, expect some regulatory strife as well. For example, there is already trouble brewing in Texas, where the market has been very difficult to get into for many CLECs. Some claim that the incumbents have been less than cooperative regarding collocation and access charges. It may appear unfair to some of the CLECs that SBC can get a jump on the market when things have been so difficult for the CLECs. Perhaps the grumbling will not result in anything major, however. After all, so far most of what is coming out of California is support for the bold step SBC is taking. Perhaps this will be the outcome in Texas as well. Despite the grumbling, the plans SBC announced are tremendous in terms of pushing the market forward. Perhaps this is the jump the industry needed to open up the consumer market. All the other announcements support the same thing. With AOL coming on board, this can only serve to build interest in DSL technology for consumers. As for Lucent, Lucent wins. Ascend is a leader in WAN core switching and access data networking equipment for telcos and ISPs. This rounds out the portfolio Lucent has been building over the past two years via mergers and acquisitions. I can hardly wait to see what will happen in the next few weeks! Let¹s hope for more earthquakes! by Laurie Falconer Page last modified Fri, Aug 07, 1998 - 03:56 PM EDT ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Register Here € xDSL Home € Today € Alert Services € Buyer's Guide Strategies € Background € Archives € Services € xDSL Site Copyright © 1995-1998 TeleChoice, Inc. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy.