Verizon recasts DSL

Wi-Fi access, price cuts and speed increase intended to spur demand, stave off competitors.

NEW YORK - Verizon last week revamped its DSL services in an attempt to spur demand and increase its share of the broadband market.

Verizon plans to extend broadband capacity to 80% of its 57.5 million access lines by year-end, and its new DSL packaging and pricing is intended to drive that, company executives say.

Among the regional Bell operating companies, Verizon, with 1.8 million lines, is the No. 2 provider of DSL, behind SBC, which has 2.2 million lines in service.

Increased penetration should help Verizon achieve profitability from its DSL service faster, they add.

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NEW YORK - Verizon last week revamped its DSL services in an attempt to spur demand and increase its share of the broadband market.

Verizon plans to extend broadband capacity to 80% of its 57.5 million access lines by year-end, and its new DSL packaging and pricing is intended to drive that, company executives say.

Among the regional Bell operating companies, Verizon, with 1.8 million lines, is the No. 2 provider of DSL, behind SBC, which has 2.2 million lines in service.

Increased penetration should help Verizon achieve profitability from its DSL service faster, they add.

A profitable service means more money to roll out more services for business users, which translates into customer loyalty, according to analysts.

"We expect the lower price to reduce churn in the DSL base, a prime contributor to lower margins in DSL," John Hodulik of UBS Warburg said in a bulletin issued last week. "Longer term, this offer is clearly focused on the large cable [operators] in an effort to take back market share in high-speed data and head off competition from cable telephony down the road."

Verizon is rolling out Wi-Fi-based wireless broadband Internet access for 1,000 pay phones in New York City. This will let Verizon's Online DSL customers who have laptops, PDAs or Pocket PCs gain free wireless Internet access if they are within 300 feet of a Wi-Fi-enabled pay phone - or hot spot.

Verizon already has 150 such hot spots. Three hundred and fifty will be turned on this summer, and 1,000 by year-end, Verizon officials say.

Verizon decreased the monthly entry fee from $49.95 to $34.95 for consumers (www.nwfusion.com, DocFinder: 5939), and by $10 to $59.95 and $89.95 for small businesses, depending on the type of DSL service they buy. Verizon also has upped the downstream speed from 768K to 1.5M bit/sec.

Verizon Freedom for Business packages now offer a 20% discount on the monthly recurring charge for any business DSL package, the carrier says. Residential users who purchase DSL as part of Verizon's Freedom local/long-distance bundled service will get it for $29.95 per month instead of $34.95, the carrier says. The new lower rates will become effective for existing Verizon Online DSL customers May 21. Customers will see the new prices on their June and July bills, Verizon says.

The RBOC also has bundled the recast DSL service with Microsoft's MSN 8.0 software, which includes shared browsing technology, advanced parental controls, e-mail virus protection and spam filters, research and learning tools from MSN Encarta Plus, financial management software, and photo editing.

The new service will soon feature Verizon's Digital Companion service that is currently in development. Digital Companion will let customers integrate calendars, address books and to-do lists with caller ID tracking, call dialing and call forwarding, the carrier says.

Verizon and Microsoft entered into a broadband content delivery relationship last June. SBC has a similar relationship with Yahoo, and the two unveiled their service last September.

New customers will receive MSN 8.0 with their Verizon Online DSL installation CD, and existing customers can order the CD for free.

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