If you live outside the SBC Communications service area, chances are you haven't thought of the company as a local carrier. But that is about to change.
SBC has enlisted Network Access Solutions (NAS) to set up a digital subscriber line infrastructure outside SBC's home territory so SBC can sell digital subscriber line (DSL) service anywhere in the U.S.
To accomplish this, SBC has invested $150 million in NAS so it can set up its DSL equipment in switching offices in the BellSouth and US WEST service areas. NAS already has DSL gear installed in the Bell Atlantic area.
SBC will start its out-of-region push in Boston, Miami and Seattle later this year.
The Federal Communications Commission is forcing SBC to sell phone services outside its footprint as a condition of letting SBC buy Ameritech. That is to insure that the megamerger doesn't result in less local phone competition.
But SBC says it also wants to be able to offer customers DSL connections wherever customers have sites that need high-speed access.
The deal also makes NAS a national DSL player. It will resell SBC DSL services within the SBC territory, and by virtue of SBC's investment in NAS, NAS will own DSL facilities in the rest of the country.
NAS already has DSL gear in 360 Bell Atlantic switching offices, and plans to have 500 by year-end. The SBC investment will put NAS gear in 500 BellSouth and 500 US WEST switching offices as well, according to John Aust, CEO of NAS.
TelMex, which owns Prodigy, also invested in NAS. That relationship will make it possible for NAS and Prodigy to offer high-speed Internet service packages, Aust says.
SBC and NAS also plan to sell voice-over-DSL connections at some point, but will not say exactly when.
Voice and data services over DSL are already the core of SBC's plan to upgrade its phone network inside SBC territory. SBC plans to use capacity on Williams Communications long-distance network to support SBC long-haul services outside SBC territory, says Steve McGaw, managing director of corporate development for SBC Telecom, SBC's division selling servcies outside SBC territory.
SBC will also deploy frame relay and ATM switches as a backbone network nationwide, McGaw says.
The arrangement between SBC and NAS will push NAS to sell DSL services to residential customers. Until now it has focused on business, selling a symmetric DSL service for $175 per month. The deal will also push SBC, which had been targeting residential customers for DSL, to sell DSL to businesses, Aust says.
Both companies will connect their ordering systems so orders taken by one company will be electronically deposited in the other's ordering system, McGaw says
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