Qwest comes clean on 20Mb/s FTTN

Qwest Communications today hailed two new DSL offerings, at 20 Megabits per second and 12 Mb/s, over its fiber-to-the-node architecture. Travis Leo, product director for broadband at Qwest, spoke to Editor-in-Chief Carol Wilson about Qwest Connect Quantum and Qwest Connect Titanium.

On availability of the new services: We don’t dislose where we are now, although we will be announcing significant milestones. We will pass 2 million homes by the end of the year, and I can say we are ahead of schedule to meet or exceed that mark.

On the network/technology in use: Our node size is generally from 300 to 500 customers. We are able to deliver these over our ADSL 2+ archtecture without bonding. We are looking at pair-bonding as well as VDSL 2 to increase both the upload and download speeds over time. The typical copper loop lengths vary on a lot of different factors, but we design our distribution areas such that the vast majority of customers in those areas will be able to take advantage of these offerings.

On pricing of the services: The Qwest Connect Titanium is priced at $46.99, and that’s a price for life, not an introductory offer, if you have an agreement with Qwest and the qualifying home-phone package with us. Without the home phone package, it’s $5 more. The same is true for Qwest Connect Quantum. It is $5 a month more without the phone package. We have a bundled discount structure that is different depending on the number of products you have. If you have a home phone, long-distance, broadband and DirecTV from us, you get a $20 savings. If you add wireless as a fifth product, the discount goes to $27 a month.

On how these services stack up to cable in Qwest territory: We think we are providing the right products at the right price for the customer. If you want the fastest speed avialable – Qwest Connect Quantum is the fastest one. If you want a good value, Qwest Connect Titatium is an extremely good value. We did some deployments in 2007 that we are starting to get history on. When faster speeds are available, customers are adopting those faster speeds.

On using faster broadband to subtitute for voice and video lines: Both of these services are available as standalones. We have seen some of that. But we also have seen a really compelling value proposition to bundle Internet with TV and phone. We think our bundle propositon in conjunction with Qwest Connect will also have market appeal.