AT&T's Concert program: Carrier tunes up for BT pairing

AT&T will beef up its international business services by integrating the Concert global telecom products of its joint venture partner, BT.

The announcement is the first concrete result of the partnership, announced in July.

"Customers have been telling us they want to get AT&T's networking expertise worldwide," said Robert Annunziata, president of AT&T's business services unit. "[This] enables us to deliver an expanded portfolio of end-to-end global seamless services."

"We're delighted to be working with AT&T," said Peter Manning, president and CEO of Concert Business Services, which BT now controls after buying out MCI WorldCom in September. "The speed of this venture demonstrates the commitment both companies bring to the enterprise. In less than 65 days, we've connected not only our fibers and our switches but our services."

The new product suite, labeled AT&T Concert Services in the U.S., will encompass voice, data and Internet protocol (IP) services, including a new InternetPlus service for IP access in 15 countries. InternetPlus will offer consolidated billing and access speeds of 64 to 512 kb/s.

Network integration has been easy, Annunziata said: "I don't know whether it was excellent planning or just blind good luck, but we both built on extremely compatible platforms."

The Concert suite solves a strategic problem AT&T has faced recently-providing international connectivity to businesses, said John Hanson, vice president of telecommunications analysis for Mercer Management Consulting. As such, he added, it complements last July's purchase of Teleport Communications Group, which offers local services to businesses.

Hanson also credits AT&T for being opportunistic and aggressive in moving in on Concert after the deal with MCI fell through.

Under the terms of the Concert sale, MCI WorldCom retains the right to sell Concert products for the next two years. About 500 of Concert's current 4000 customers-mostly multinational corporations-get those services through contract with MCI WorldCom, an MCI spokesman said, and some contracts may run five years. "At the end of those contracts, we're obviously going to try to win that business and put it onto what will then be dedicated MCI facilities," he said.

MCI WorldCom's advantage is its proprietary network that now connects seven European countries-10 by January 1999. "Concert will always have to rely on joint venture partners, so there are potential bottlenecks," the MCI spokesman said.

Ending several investigations stemming from PCS auctions, the Department of Justice last week filed lawsuits against three wireless companies. All three carriers-Mercury PCS II LLC, Omnipoint Corp. and 21st Century Bidding Corp.-simultaneously agreed to consent decrees, settling the suits.

In its complaint, the DOJ said the companies used coded bids to signal information to competitors. As a result, the DOJ said the government received less money than it would have otherwise in three markets.

The consent decrees mean that these companies have agreed not to violate collusion rules in the future. The companies are subject to criminal contempt citations if they willfully violate the consent decree, said John Nannes, deputy attorney general in the Antitrust Division of the DOJ.

Officials at Omnipoint were caught off-guard by the timing of the DOJ's announcement, said Terry Phillips, Omnipoint director of external affairs. "We believe they deliberately waited until the [stock] market was about to close. It sent Wall Street into a tailspin," he said. At one point, the company's stock dropped $3 a share, he added.

Both Omnipoint and Mercury representatives said many other bidders acted similarly during the auctions. However, William Mounger, Mercury chairman, said they were happy to have the issue resolved. 21st Century Bidding Corp. representatives could not be reached.

"If anyone had made a ton of bucks" from these actions, a stronger punishment would've been warranted, said Patricia Martin, director of communications and information technology for Decision Resource Inc. "But really, how much harm was done?" she asked.

Omnipoint, based in Bethesda, Md., owns 140 licenses and offers PCS in six markets. The other companies own licensees but do not yet offer PCS.

OPENING THE GATEWAYS

Cisco Systems and VocalTec Communications have teamed to make their IP telephony solutions interoperable based on the International Telecommunication Union's H.323 Version 2 standard. Field trials should start before the end of the year with products available in early 1999.

TIME WARNER TAPS LUCENT

Time Warner Inc.'s telephony unit has chosen Lucent Technologies to supply $250 million worth of optical networking communications software, switch and access products.