California dreaming: U S West unveils national strategy, extends DSL

Any thoughts that U S West would fade quietly into its merger with Qwest Communications were shattered last week when the company made some announcements that position it to compete in markets outside its 14-state region and become significantly more aggressive in DSL and network management services.

Previously, the company announced intentions to provide service on a national basis in conjunction with Qwest but provided few details. Using Networld + Interop in Las Vegas as its platform last week, the company said it is offering DSL service in Sacramento in competition with SBC Communications under two separate programs, Integrated Solutions for Buildings and Integrated Business Solutions.

In the former, the company targets small and medium-sized business located in concentrated business districts. The latter service is directed at the multi-tenant market, with U S West using copper or fiber provided by a local carrier.

"This is really part of U S West's larger strategy, both nationally and internationally," said Steve Starliper, vice president and general manager of national integration for U S West. "We plan to be in 25 markets by the end of 2001, and this is the first step in that."

In the next few weeks, the company will extend the two services to San Diego, San Francisco and San Jose. Soon after, the company will launch the service on the East Coast. The RBOC plans to provide more than just access service.

"It's not just about products. It's not just about pipes," Starliper said.

Indeed, U S West plans to provide a series of products, including building-based intranets, Web site design and hosting. The next program phase will add voice service, Internet security solutions and hosted business applications. Eventually, it will offer voice-over-IP services, though its technical trial with Cisco Systems is the only available detail on that plan.

U S West's first major out-of-region data move comes a few weeks after SBC announced a deal with Cisco to purchase central office-based DSL equipment. SBC also is seeing solid results from its high-profile Project Pronto DSL program, processing about 3000 orders per day, said J. Thomas McGrath, president of SBC DataComm.

"We're definitely moving faster than the estimates," McGrath said.

In a separate statement, U S West announced Digital Anywhere, a new program that will extend its MegaBit DSL services to remote employees of U S West data customers. Initially, the program will offer a package of DSL, ISDN DSL (IDSL) and ISDN access to companies with 25 or more high-speed connections. As part of the program, the company also offers free upgrades to faster-speed services as they become available.

U S West is offering Digital Anywhere to reach throughout the company's geographically difficult base, which includes many rural local loops where DSL service is technically or economically unfeasible.

Another challenge for U S West is its large number of digital loop carriers, which make it difficult to provide DSL-based services. In many of those instances, the company will deploy fiber to a neighborhood node and provide very high bit-rate DSL.

"As we extend fiber out to these nodes, we're finding there's a 99% probability of delivering service," said Sol Trujillo, chairman, president and CEO of U S West.

DSL is available to about 45% of lines served by U S West DSL-equipped COs. IDSL is available to about 58% of the company's lines, while ISDN is almost ubiquitous and available to about 95% of U S West's customers.

Already, U S West has a number of Digital Anywhere customers, including Novell. For Novell, the service complements its previous directive that most employees sign up individually for high-speed service at their own homes.

"We wanted them to do it, so they could feel the pain [of signing up individually]," said Jon Day, director of global infrastructure for Novell. With the Digital Anywhere, much of the initial installation has been standardized. "I want the same technology. I want it to look like one network."