DSL Prime News Briefs

DSL news from North America and around the world.

by Dave Burstein DSL Prime [March 1, 2004]

E-mail

• Tom Willie on the FCC's approval of powerline broadband. "Now, we push on the accelerator and speed up. Today's system can support 3 Mbps to 5 Mbps symmetric data to every outlet in the home, full home network automatically enabled as part of the broadband service, full support for VoIP with well-respected end-to-end QoS methods available today (not just best effort over a transport network)." Tom's President of Current Technologies now, after playing a key role at Efficient. "You can always turn your camera off!" Rich Korzeniewski of Viditel reminds me, suggesting I try their well-reviewed video service. My guess is teenagers with cameras on their cellphones will pave the way.

Briefs

• From a happy DSL Reports user, "Downtown Toronto and just noticed that I have been upgraded. A 5mb download went real fast and so I checked my speed: 2554 kbps down; 682 kbps up. Very very cool. I can be happy with this speed for at least a year."
  
  
• The difference between DSL Reports and some commercial DSL lookup sights is extreme. One wrote me to exchange links, but when I put in a Manhattan address was surprised to discover my only choices were EarthLink or satellite. Verizon, Covad, and Time Warner all serve the building, contrary to the site notice All service provider databases in your neighborhood have been checked. If Cable or DSL offers are not shown, that means the service is not available at your address. Service provider databases checked include most major phone and cable companies.
  
  
• Telecom Italia has 180,000 DSL subscribers between France and Germany, Serafino Abate of Ovum reports. They've budgeted 100 million Euros to compete in France, and are planning to expand in Germany beyond the Hansenet purchase.
  
  
• John Latta of the Wave Report, just back from Korea, reports that even the most successful DSL deployment in the world doesn't guarantee miracles for KT's bottom line. At 70 percent broadband, the market just isn't growing any more, and plans to upsell customers to more expensive services are selling relatively slowly. In the rest of the world, 200,000 paying customers for video over DSL would be a great achievement, but the Koreans have far higher hopes.
  
  
• Anton Wahlman reports Swisscom is having success with Netopia's $25 "USB dongle" I wrote about last issue, giving it away to customers Yahoo/Softbank/Japan-style. With lower equipment prices, marketing strategies change.

People

• Tim Donovan, ex-Zhone and UTStarcom, is now at Synaptex, bringing to market a package developed at HP to co-ordinate marketing information and tools throughout a large company. Jeff Burkland and Terry Tippie of UTStarcom have joined him.
  
  
• David Isenberg, one of the most original minds in the field, is drawing some fascinating like-minded folk Westchester, New York April 2-4 for WTF!—A Gathering of Smart People. I expect to be totally zonked after Fast Net, but I'll try to join people like Denise Caruso and David Reed to think about what's the future.
  
  
• Dan Berninger, my friend and sometimes conference colleague, is organizing a remarkable Internet Commons Congress in D.C. March 24-25. Extraordinary project, extraordinary speakers, well worth joining. Jennie and I will be there.
  
  
• For job ads, and more about the Fast Net conference, see the DSL Prime website.

Press

• Ben Silverman in the New York Post picked up my remark On Comcast/Disney, someone should be pointing out that Comcast may have cash flow but none of the cable companies show any earnings, One day, the Street will catch on to the low earnings on the cable side. It's the one trump the telcos have, that the air could come out of cable stock prices." Silverman added, "average EPS for the trailing 12 months in the cable and satellite industry is negative 47 cents." An analyst thought I missed the point, because "cable values are based on cash flow." He s absolutely right about how the street thinks today, but I believe in actual earnings for the long term. Personally, I believe actual earnings matter sooner or later. A more relevant disagreement was that cable earnings could rise dramatically the next few years, as they can reduce capex after completing much of the digital buildout. A more important disagreement came from two well-informed wall streeters who believe cable earnings will turn around. The digital cable networks are mostly built, they believe, allowing a major reduction in capital spending.

Copyright 2004 Dave Burstein.
The DSL Prime Newsletter is reprinted with permission.

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