Qwest, AOL Time Warner expand transport agreement

Qwest and AOL Time Warner (AOLTW) today announced an agreement in which AOLTW will lease capacity from Qwest’s domestic and international data backbone and purchase DSL and dial-up access services from the carrier’s nationwide footprint.

The contract both extends and significantly expands a multi-year backbone transport agreement signed in January 1999. AOLTW will expand its network capacity agreements with Qwest to its international partner KPNQwest, as well as become a primary ISP on the carrier’s last-mile access networks, Qwest officials said.

“This is one of the largest contracts in the history of Qwest,” a Qwest spokeswoman said. “The fact that they not only chose to continue to work with us but expanded the contract shows just how much confidence [AOLTW] has in our network.”

Qwest has also agreed to advertise across AOLTW’s extensive portfolio of online, print and television outlets.

Neither Qwest nor AOLTW revealed any financial details of the deal.