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Technology Stocks : LAST MILE TECHNOLOGIES - Let's Discuss Them Here -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Doughboy who wrote (3634)	5/11/1999 2:04:00 PM
From: Frank A. Coluccio	Respond to of 12823

Hi Doug, good point, and one that's discussed here from time to time, as you know. A lot of things take place and emerge from the smoke filled rooms. Gambits are crafted, bones are thrown onto the table for the outside world to see as distractions. And there is sure to be politics and in-fighting, caused by differing philosophical views among the principals in the ILECs, as well. Sometimes these aren't all that pretty. I could only surmise, but have no way of unscrambling with any certainty what's going on. Perhaps the sum total effect of all of these circumstances is delay. It serves the ILECs' purposes well, allowing them to take an elongated pause, spanning several years, while affording them a plausible (albeit, not a very pleasant) image, as to why they are not moving very quickly, or at all, in some instances. All the while, they have very likely been planning a larger and more formidable assault all their own. One which will inevitably yield a higher price-performance. Hence, a lower pricing structure to end users than the current offerings by their early DLEC competitors. With time, the other normal declines in cost-price take place as well. To add to this they have the ubiquity and the resulting economies of scale due to their extended serving areas. Smaller upstarts can only hope to some day achieve that same kind of scale. That's one man's theory, in any event, but to be sure, I don't know this for sure. Tim? What say yee here, if you can speak to this? Frank

To: Doughboy who wrote (3634)	5/11/1999 2:45:00 PM
From: MikeM54321	Read Replies (4) \| Respond to of 12823

Re: DSL Providers and Equipment Companies Darren/Frank/Doug/Bernard/Thread, All our discussions in the past concerning DSL service rollouts has been very enlightening, as have your most recent comments. But IMHO, much as I can hardly believe it, DSL Services are here and now. No matter who rolls them out (I didn't even include the substantial AT&T announcement), it really does not matter to me. I'm taking what time I have, to try to lock down some investment ideas. Here's my current watch list in two main groups: DSL Providers ----------------- Comdisco (CDO) Copper Mountain (IPO soon) Covad (COVD) DSL Net (IPO soon) Dakota Services (IPO soon) Harvard Net (IPO soon) Network Access Solution (IPO soon) Northpoint (NPNT) Rhythms (RTHM) Time Warner Telecom (IPO soon) DSL Equipment ------------------ Adtran (ADTN) Alcatel (ALA) Aware (AWRE) Pairgain (PAIR) Paradyne (IPO soon) Tuts Sytems (TUTS) Westell (WSTL) As I am taking my time learning about all of the companies above, I almost feel like throwing darts. If I had done that in January, I would be up 40%YTD in either sector! So I'm eagerly trying to figure out which one(s) have the most potential from here on out. It is not an easy task (Or maybe I should throw darts now<G>). I just do not know how to evaluate the DSL Providers. It's a mystery to me how much they are going to be worth in the future to the ILEC's? I'm assuming that would be the main goal of any of them. To be bought out by an ILEC (or maybe even a long distance company if FCC approved it). But if the ILECs really get their rollouts going, then would they just build their own DSL networks? Would the DSL Providers network be compatible with the ILEC's? etc., etc. As for the equipment companies, I'm somewhat lost there too. The only one I had any time to look into, so far, is Adtran. From a cursory review, it appears they have everything a DSL rollout needs. Almost too much because a lot of their stuff is legacy. They have been around a very long time(in tech time). It also seems they are betting a lot on HDSL2. What is HDSL2 and how important is it going to be for higher bandwidth speeds? I'm assuming that this is the goal of HDSL2 standards? The rest of the equipment companies on my list, I have not looked into with any detail. But one thing I noticed, there are more DSL Modem Makers than you can shake a stick at. So I'm can't believe this won't rapidly become a commodity business. I know I threw out a lot of names, etc. above. But if anyone has anything to offer on any of the above or any new investment, ideas, companies, comments, opinions, it would be much appreciated. MikeM(From Florida)