AT&T, Verizon Still behind Cable Rivals in Broadband Growth
Cable Internet
AT&T, Verizon Still behind Cable Rivals in Broadband Growth
Figures show that the biggest telephone companies in the US are growing their broadband subscriber bases but their growth rate is slower than their cable rivals as indicated by the figures of the first quarter. In broadband Internet wars, Verizon and AT&T are way behind Time Warner Cable and Comcast.
The two major telcos have suffered losses in their ADSL Internet operations however these losses have been partially offset by the gains made by their respective FiOS and U-Verse businesses.
AT&T U-Verse gained 718,000 customers in the last quarter to reach an overall subscriber base of 5.9 million. However the net subscriber gain was only 103,000 as the company lost subscribers in the wire-line broadband sector. AT&T provides satellite and DSL line broadband under its wire-line broadband services.
Verizon too suffered DSL losses which hampered its broadband growth although it posted its highest quarterly net increase since the second quarter in 2009. Verizon lost 89,000 DSL subscribers in the first quarter of 2012. In the corresponding period last year Verizon had lost 109,000 DSL subscribers. It also gained 193,000 new FiOS subscribers.
Verizon’s and AT&T’s cable rivals continued to show good performance in adding a greater number of subscribers. Time Warner added 214,000 domestic broadband subscribers whereas Comcast added another 439,000.
The numbers are indicative of an industry trend where telephone companies have lagged behind the cable companies in broadband growth. Leichtman Research Group, earlier this year reported that phone companies served about 34.3 million subscribers whereas cable companies supported 44.3 million subscribers.
However the pay TV market hasn’t been so kind to the cable industry. In the last quarter Comcast, the largest cable TV provider lost 37,000 video customers in what is believed to be its 20th consecutive quarterly loss in video customers. Time Warner too lost 94,000 subscribers in the last quarter.
Categories: At&t, Broadband, Cable Internet, Comcast, Internet News, Time Warner Cable, Verizon Tags: At&t, Broadband, Comcast, time warner cable, Verizon
Senate Urged To Probe Data Caps
Senate Urged To Probe Data Caps
Senate Urged To Probe Data Caps
Consumer advocacy groups have appealed to lawmakers to intervene in the broadband capping introduced by Internet service providers.
In a letter sent to the leaders of the Senate Commerce Committee, representatives of the New America Foundation, Consumer’s Union, Public Knowledge and Free Press stated that broadband caps generally reduce broadband use and discourage large bandwidth applications like online video. These organizations have urged lawmakers to consider the issue when it comes for a hearing on online video distribution.
Several years ago, few wire-line service providers started imposing data usage caps with high enough data limits which consumers didn’t come close enough to exceeding at that time. In 2008, Comcast started limiting residential usage to 250 GB per month which is roughly equal to 125 standard definition movies.
ISPs argue that introduction of data caps helps in limiting network congestion but critics say that there are other means through which they can control traffic.
Joel Kelsey, Free Press policy adviser remarked that traffic congestion is dynamic and temporary and cannot be an excuse to introduce uniform data capping which doesn’t make sense. Instead he advocates that networks should manage congestion better.
Broadband experts also believe that introducing caps will discourage people from watching online TV programs instead of watching them on pricey cable TV. He says consumers will be dissuaded from using high bandwidth applications when the meter is always running.
The letter focuses on wire-line providers but recently even wireless carriers discontinued their unlimited data plans. Verizon and AT&T lately had introduced tiered pricing and T-mobile had recently introduced monthly data caps and block users for exceeding them.
Public Knowledge, another group in the association has argued in a separate research that pay per byte pricing is illogical. At the most carriers can introduce this plan during peak hours and when there are chances of network congestion. During non peak hours when there is no chance of congestion, this pricing doesn’t make sense.
More Data Cap Info:
Comcast Usage Caps Ruining Families? – http://isp1.us/blog/comcast-usage-caps-ruining-families/
AT&T Implementing Home Internet Caps Starting May 2nd – http://isp1.us/blog/att-implementing-home-internet-caps-starting-may-2nd/
Xfinity for Xbox 360 Not Restricted by Comcast Bandwidth Caps – http://isp1.us/blog/xfinity-for-xbox-360-not-restricted-by-comcast-bandwidth-caps/
AT&T to Introduce Data Caps on DSL – http://isp1.us/blog/att-to-introduce-data-caps-on-dsl/
Cox – Still No Plans for Usage-Based Internet Fees – http://isp1.us/blog/cox-still-no-plans-for-usage-based-internet-fees/
Categories: Broadband, Comcast, Government, Internet Caps, Internet News, ISP, Wireless Tags: Broadband, Data Caps, Senate
Verizon Fires Back at Critics of Deal
Verizon Fires Back at Critics of Deal
Verizon Fires Back at Critics of Deal
Last week Verizon hit out against critics of the proposed deal between Verizon and a coalition of cable companies in a representation made by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).
The deal will clear the path for Verizon to buy spectrum from Bright House, Time Warner Cable, Cox and Comcast . These companies have also agreed to cross selling of each other’s products and services.
Consumer rights groups like Free, Press and Public Knowledge as well as communications companies like T-Mobile have objected to the deal saying it will allow Verizon to become the dominant player in the market and it is against the practice of fair competition. These groups have requested the FCC to block the deal.
In its reply to the FCC, Verizon has said that on one hand these companies were not using their spectrum and on the other hand Verizon was finding it difficult to meet the growing frequency demands of its customers.
Verizon also argued that the FCC should not consider other alternatives to the deal like the companies selling their spectrum to T-Mobile.
T-Mobile in its filing with the FCC has stated that Verizon already has the majority of spectrum owned by any carrier and the deal will allow Verizon to block other carriers from accessing this valuable resource. But Verizon has firmly denied the accusation saying that it is not interested in warehousing and the accusation against it is absolutely false. The company thinks itself as a good steward of the spectrum and it needed more spectrum to fulfill customers’ demands for 4G LTE service and cable Internet subscribers.
Consumer groups feel that the deal will push the market towards duopoly with AT&T Verizon sharing the pie amongst them. The company argued that the market is very competitive and that neither AT&T nor Verizon owned the most spectrum’s but that distinction went to Clearwire, another wireless Internet provider.
Categories: At&t, Bright House, Comcast, Cox, FCC, Internet News, T-Mobile, Time Warner Cable, Wireless Tags: FCC, Verizon
Comcast beaming with $1.22 billion in first-quarter revenue
Comcast beaming with $1.22 billion in 1st-quarter revenue
Comcast is beaming with $1.22 billion in first-quarter revenue
Comcast, one of the largest cable providers in the country reported that it earned a 30 percent profit increase in Q1 of 2012 on the back of advertising during the Super Bowl and its hugely popular broadband Internet service.
Last week the Philadelphia based company declared its first quarterly results wherein its income rose to $1.22 billion between January and March. The shares rose from 34 cents a year ago to 45 cents during Q1 of 2012.
Comcast’s revenue was up by 9.6% and stood at $14.9 billion which included cable and NBC Universal results.
In Jan 2011 Comcast had closed its acquisition of NBC Universal which owns movie studios and TV channels. NBC Universal accounted for a third of Comcast’s revenue. The NBC broadcast network grew over 37 percent largely due to the Super Bowl which was broadcasted by Fox in 2011. Apart from the Super Bowl, NBCs revenue also increased due to shows like “Smash” and “The Voice.” Comcast’s other stable cable business grew at a modest 5.7 % from the previous year.
Comcast CEO, Brian Roberts had earlier suggested that Comcast would be able to arrest the trend of cable TV subscribers cancelling their subscription in favor of TV service provided by telephone and satellite companies but the results show otherwise as Comcast lost 37,000 cable TV subscribers in Q1 of 2012, approximately the same number it had lost in the same quarter of the previous year. However Roberts was optimistic and told analysts that he believed Comcast can continue to make progress to retain video subscribers. Roberts did mention that its web based video service, Streampix was launched for its video customers in February. The company also added 439,000 internet subscribers in the last quarter which is the highest number of new subscribers for any quarter in the past 4 years.
Internet Service and TV Service Providers Earn Poor Customer Experience Ratings, According to New Temkin Group Research
Internet Service
Internet Service and TV Service Providers Earn Poor Customer Experience Ratings, According to New Temkin Group Research
Temkin Group has published its latest report and Temkin Experience Ratings covering 206 big companies from 18 diverse industries. This is the second consecutive year when Temkin has come out with the ratings.
The research was based on a survey covering 10,000 consumers in the US in January 2012. The survey covered 11 Internet service providers including Verizon, Road Runner Internet, Qwest, MSN, EarthLink, Cox Communications, Comcast, Charter Communications, Cablevision, AT&T and AOL and 10 Television service providers including Verizon, Time Warner Cable, Optimum/ Cablevision, Dish TV, DirecTV, Cox Communications, Comcast, Charter Communications, Bright House Networks and AT&T
The study compared 21 organizations from both Internet and cable space only three of them received OK rating. Cablevision (Internet), Dish Network (TV) and Bright House Networks (TV). Fifteen received poor and three were rated very poor.
The TV and Internet services were rated 16th and 17th respectively from amongst 18 industries covered in the study on customer experience. Only health plans scored lower than these two. EarthLink and Charter communications were the lowest rated companies out of the 206 surveyed by Temkin. Eight out of the lowest 19 were from these two industries.
Bruce Temkin, the report’s author and Temkin group’s managing partner said that terrible customer service is an epidemic with cable and internet service providers. As per the analysis of the Temkin group, TV services had a modest increase in customer service experience while Internet services scored slightly less as compared to 2011.
Seven companies had an increase of more than five percentage points over the last year. They are Comcast (TV and Internet), DirecTV, Bright House Networks, Dish TV, AOL, Comcast and Cablevision. Cox Communications was the only one showing more than five percentage points decline.
The Temkin Experience rating taps three dimensions of customer satisfaction- functional, accessible and emotional.
Categories: CenturyLink, Comcast, Cox, EarthLink, Internet News, Internet Providers, Qwest, Time Warner Cable, Verizon Tags: AOL, AT&T, Cablevision, Charter Communications, Comcast, Cox Communications, EarthLink, MSN, Qwest, Road Runner Internet, Verizon
Comcast Targets Twin Cities’ Mid-Size Businesses
Twin Cities Broadband
Comcast Targets Twin Cities’ Mid-Size Businesses
For years Comcast has provided Internet services to small and medium size businesses in the Twin cities. These were aimed at businesses having less than 20 employees. Now Comcast has started thinking big. Last week was started catering medium sized businesses in the Twin cities including those which had multiple offices around the metro area. Comcast is promoting speed computer connections between these offices and to the Internet with additional options to increase the speed if companies start demanding bandwidth later. The company claims that this is a more convenient and cost effective option as compared to the traditional practice of laying a T1 line from the phone provider and then adding more T1 lines as needed for increased capacity.
But Comcast can face stiff competition in getting potential medium size business clients in the Twin Cities area because it is a relatively unknown entity in this market as compared to telecom providers AT&T and CenturyLink who practically own this market. However Comcast has been catering to this business in other areas in the country for some time. In fact the Twin Cities area is the last major metropolitan area to get this service from Comcast as part of Comcast’s plan of city by city deployment in the U.S.
Comcast has dubbed its service the Metro Ethernet which uses the fiber optic cable network in the Twin cities, downtown areas and major suburbs. These areas are choc- a- bloc with high tech office parks. Connecting to this grid, Comcast claims that it will electronically Turbocharge companies which depend on instantaneous digital communication between desks and offices. Comcast knows it isn’t the only company which can provide fiber optic communication to other companies but it claims that its unique selling points are raw speeds at comparatively affordable prices.
Television and telephone services are not a part of the Metro Ethernet plan at the moment but the company said that these could be layered or provided if a customer demands.
Categories: Business Internet, Comcast, Fiber Optic, Metro Ethernet, T1 Line Tags: Businesses, Comcas, metro ethernet, T1, Twin Cities
Verizon, Time Warner Offering Internet, Cable Bundles Despite Concerns
Internet Bundles
Verizon, Time Warner Offering Internet, Cable Bundles Despite Concerns
Time Warner Cable and Verizon Wireless announced last week that users in some parts of North Carolina, Kansas and Ohio can now sign up for their bundled offerings including Time Warner Internet, video and voice services and Verizon tablets and Smartphones. This announcement from the two companies comes even as federal regulators are deciding whether deals like this or even such partnerships are ethical or legal.
In December 2011, Verizon had announced that it has signed a deal with SpectrumCo a combination of BrightHouse Networks, Comcast and Time Warner. As part of the deal Verizon would purchase wireless spectrum from these companies and sell some SpectrumCo products and in return the other companies would market Verizon’s mobile products and services. The marketing aspect of the deal had raised issues in the industry with U.S. Senator Al Franken expressing concern that consumers would suffer if major competitors became allies. On March 21, members of the Senate Subcommittee on Antitrust, Competition Policy and Consumer Rights questioned officials from Comcast and Verizon as well as officials from their rival companies opposing the deal.
Senator Amy Klobuchar though that such Internet bundles would bind consumers to pay more or result in less competition ultimately giving very few options for the consumers to choose from. On the contrary, Randall Milch, Verizon’s Executive Vice President and general counsel told her that nobody is constrained to buying in bundles. The consumers will not lose on anything except choose from a sort of discount which they might or might not choose.
Rural Telecommunications Group (RTG), Sprint and T-Mobile are more upset regarding the spectrum trading aspect of the deal. Carri Bennet, RTG’s general counsel said that Verizon Wireless is trying to capture the market of the commercial wireless spectrum and stripping existing competitors of their spectrum holdings. This practice in against competition and in violation of anti- trust laws and it should be denied by the FCC.
Categories: Cable Internet, Comcast, Internet News, Kansas, North Carolina, Ohio, Time Warner Cable, Verizon Tags: Cable Bundles, FCC, Internet, Time Warner, Verizon
Verizon-Cable Deal Raises Major Concerns
Verizon-Cable Deal Raises Major Concerns
Verizon-Cable Deal Raises Major Concerns, According to Public Knowledge
The debate about Verizon’s bid to purchase spectrum from its competitors is still not over even after last week’s hearing which tried to throw some light on the issue. Verizon Wireless had announced in December 2011 a deal to buy unused spectrum from Time Warner Cable, Cox Communications, Comcast and Bright House Communications for over 3.6 billion dollars.
However public opposition to the deal seems to be growing. Numbers of public interest groups and other wireless carriers like T-Mobile and Sprint have been arguing their cases quite vocally. They even filed a petition in court to stall the deal. The groups argued in the petition that the proposed deal would change the fundamental nature of telecommunications in the US in a manner which contradicts the Telecommunications Act of 1996.
In the first place companies have agreed to sell more spectrum to the largest spectrum holder in the country further aggravating the anti-competitive spectrum problem and secondly these companies have critical side agreements which give rise to serious concerns when these companies actively collude with each other and further decline to compete.
During last week’s hearing the antitrust committee of the Senate Judiciary Committee tried to find out if the group of cable companies had tried to reach other companies before Verizon. But that question remained unanswered.
Senator Herb Kohl, chairman of the antitrust subcommittee questioned Verizon and other cable companies if they had called a truce and are standing down as rivals. He feared that the deal would undo all the hard work done in maintaining healthy competition over the years. He noted that Verizon has no incentive in the deal as its affiliates would be selling Time Warner or Bright House or Comcast. Verizon would not be able to build or improve its product. He also added that there would be a decrease in competition for FiOS and since most places do not have Verizon FiOS they would have to endure with slow DSL Internet or cable options.
Categories: Bright House, Cable Internet, Comcast, DSL, FiOS, Internet News, Time Warner Cable, Verizon Tags: bright house, cox, DSL, fios, Time Warner, Verizon
Comcast Offers Advanced Home Security System
Comcast Offers Advanced Home Security System
Comcast Offers Advanced Home Security System
Comcast executive Mitch Bowling used his Apple iPad, 3,000 miles away from his home to view his dog while sleeping and turn on a garage light.
Bowling, senior vice president and general manager for new business said that everyone has only been talking about futuristic homes which are smart and remote controlled. It’s already here.
Starting 30th March Comcast is selling its Xfinity Home service which combines a traditional home alarm system with hi tech home climate and lighting controls. Currently the company has introduced this service in the San Francisco, South Bay and the Peninsula
According to Bowling the time is perfect for Comcast, a traditional broadband and cable provider to branch into what he calls a lifestyle system especially because tablets and smart phones have created awareness about smart homes.
It has also come at the right time as Comcast has lost around 17,000 cable TV subscribers in the fourth quarter of 2011 although this figure is much less than the 135,000 it lost in the same period the previous year. But Comcast Internet added 336,000 broadband customers during the quarter and Xfinity home is aligned with Comcast’s Internet service.
Bowling said that going forward a smart home would be the norm or very nearly the norm for people wanting an automated home or to remain connected when they are away from their homes.
An ABI research report indicated that the home automation business is expected to grow rapidly and the users of home automation system would grow from the current figure of 1.8 million to 12 million by 2016 as other service providers like Comcast enter the fray. And Comcast is not the only one in the field. Verizon had launched its own home monitoring and control service last year with a starting price of $9.99 per month.
Categories: Comcast, Internet News, Verizon Tags: Cable, Comcast, home security, Xfinity
America Ranks # 16 in Broadband
USA Broadband Internet
America Ranks # 16 in Broadband
According to a latest survey published by the Huffington post America ranked number 16th in a list of countries based on broadband penetration, price and Internet speed. This puts America behind countries like Denmark, Portugal and Belgium where residents enjoy cheap Internet, faster downloads and better access to broadband services.
The main reason for America’s poor performance is the virtually nonexistent competition in the broadband market which means millions of Americans live without high speed Internet access and those who do have Internet access have to manage with higher prices and lowers speeds as compared to their European counterparts. Most US Internet subscribers often have a choice of only one service provider leading to quasi monopolies in the US broadband market.
Whatever semblance of competition was visible looks to vanish with a proposed deal between Verizon and other Internet service providers. Verizon has proposed a deal to buy a major chunk of the broadband spectrum from other companies like Time Warner and Comcast and resell those companies’ broadband services to its customers. If this proposed deal goes through then Verizon and AT&T would be the two biggest players in the US broadband market controlling two thirds of the total subscriber base and 80% of the revenue in the US domestic broadband market. Verizon and Comcast executives defended joint marketing and spectrum deals as a way for handling spectrum crunch for the carriers.
Verizon has reportedly agreed to pay $3.6 billion to Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Cox Communications for spectrum and marketing deals. However before the deal is finalized it has to be approved by the FCC and the Justice Department. For subscribers the only hope now is the FCC or the Justice Department blocks this deal. A few days ago the Justice Department blocked a similar deal between AT&T and T-Mobile for addressing spectrum crunch.
Categories: At&t, Broadband, Comcast, FCC, Internet News, Time Warner Cable Tags: america, Broadband, Internet, rank
