telephone companies need to be aware that cable providers with softswitch-powered infrastructure can deploy integrated features like Cox's “Phone Tools” relatively easily, at no major additional cost. They should prepare for a day when they might need to give away unified communications tools, whether unified messaging or a subset of Verizon iobi for free, as a bundling incentive and customer retention tool.
► Sprint's local telephone operations in Las Vegas should step up its efforts to sell customers on satellite communications, which should be relatively easy to deploy in the Las Vegas suburbs. The deeper Sprint can get entrenched with satellite as part of the bundle, the better defended the incumbent local carrier will be as Cox tries gradually to build out its telephone markets and lure customers with bundled services.
Recommended End User/Customer Responses
► To most residential broadband Internet customers, there isn't all that much of a difference once a customer gets above the range of 1 Mbps broadband service. While an “up to” 1.5 Mbps DSL service may have a noticeable difference compared to faster DSL and cable broadband services, any of the broadband services at this level or faster should be as much bandwidth as an ordinary customer needs for a satisfactory Web surfing experience.
► AT&T's SBC Yahoo! service does offer premium services, but many parts of the Yahoo! service are advertising supported and generally available to all eyes crossing Yahoo!'s portal. In terms of a security suite and general portal, Cox lacks a big Web portal brand name on its front page but provides all the basic amenities that an ordinary customer might want for a satisfactory Web surfing experience.
► R esidents in Las Vegas that need dialtone service, or for that matter a bundle of services, should have Cox and Sprint on their short list. But Cox estimates it will take until 2007 for the carrier to have its voice service available across all of the greater Las Vegas metro area, so customers that aren't served in the initial Cox dialtone launch may be in for a long wait.
RCN Sets Sights on Metro New York by Snapping Up ConEd Communications for $32 Million
On December 6th RCN signed a definitive agreement to purchase Consolidated Edison Communications Holding Company, Inc. (CEC), bolstering its network assets in the New York metro and bringing in large enterprise customers. It’s a savvy move, but more will be needed to jumpstart RCN BS nationally.
Recommended Competitive Responses
► Competitors can point to RCN Business Solutions’ overall product portfolio and ask just where it is going. RCN's business services are the baseline offered by similar business units of the incumbent cable carriers: cable broadband remote access and single-line voice on one hand, high-end, fiber-fed services on the other. CEC’s focus is data backup and disaster recovery, also veering towards the high-end. Where are managed services, IP VPNs, video, and voice?
► RCN Business Solutions is two months old. While it may have put together some telecom veterans with its portfolio, nothing indicates they’ll have any success this time turning around a Chapter 11 company, especially as it launches one business while bringing a new one on board.
► Competitors should point out that despite the importance of the metro New York area, RCN Business Solutions is trying to chase the large enterprise market through CEC, but can really only do so on CEC’s home turf - greater metropolitan New York. That leaves out most of RCN’s five other major metros, where CEC does not have the existing large enterprise customer base to jumpstart a Business Solutions presence there.
Recommended End User/Customer Responses
► Business customers in the metropolitan New York area should definitely look into RCN Business Solutions after the CEC deal sometime in early 2006. RCN BS is an up and comer looking for new business, so if the service mix is right, it should be willing to compete on price, and bundled discounts.
► RCN Business Solutions is a newcomer to commercial services, at least officially, so even though management is comprised of industry veterans, customers should hold their feet to the fire with tough SLAs and realistic expectations for installation dates, service upgrades, new product releases, etc.
► Because of its fiber route diversity separate from most other telcos (including Verizon), it may make sense to use RCN Business Solutions as a second or back-up carrier for redundancy in case of an outage, especially in a mission-critical and potentially high-risk area such as Manhattan. RCN BS/CEC’s disaster recovery network bypasses that city, and its fiber network is diverse from the Verizon Empire City Subway ducts used by most other telcos.
MCI Introduces a 'Smart' Security Risk Management Service
On December 6th MCI announced the launch of its NetSec Security Risk Management Service (SRM), a new managed solution that helps companies improve their security by quantifying, prioritizing, and remediating security risks across an enterprise. MCI's cloud-to-core offering enables companies to enhance their decision-making capabilities to take proactive and immediate action against threats and vulnerabilities.
Recommended Competitive Responses
► All competitors need to point out that MCI and NetSec’s merger is still a new component of the company’s portfolio and with the merger with Verizon, MCI will remain a company in flux and could be an unstable environment to do business with.
► AT&T needs to promote its own network-based security services that proactively monitor and track global attacks and can quantify and prioritize these attacks and make available all information via its user friendly customer portal.
► Symantec needs to promote its own portfolio of managed services and solutions that includes the Symantec DeepSight Alert Service that allows clients the ability to integrate security services into their existing IT infrastructure, adding flexibility to a client’s ability to ensure a proactive secure environment.
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Recommended End User/Customer Responses
► End users will be pleased with MCI’s enhancements to its security portfolio, as the acquisition of NetSec has brought new and enhanced security components to the company’s existing offerings and the pending Verizon merger will bring additional capabilities to the global provider.
► Customers should question MCI regarding all its mergers and the potential impact on services, such as primary contact information and handling of services. Questions should include potential future downtimes, as well as analyst and engineer turnover.
► Clients should perform due diligence while keeping MCI on their short list of potential providers; they should also consider AT&T, VeriSign, Symantec, Cybertrust, and others to ensure a best fit for business needs.
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