Get three services for $100/mo
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The $12.99 price is for download speeds up to 1.5 megabits per second. The carrier is also offering a higher-speed service for $17.99, which provides download speeds from 1.5mbps to 3mbps. The promotion is only for new subscribers, and the cutthroat pricing lasts only a year. After that, the monthly charge jumps to $29.99 for the lower-speed service and $34.99 for the higher-speed service.
But the new deal comes with a couple of catches. It only applies to customers who order the service online, and it also requires people to subscribe to one of the company's local phone service plans, which start around $10 per month.
AT&T and Verizon Communications have successfully used price cuts over the year to lure customers away from dial-up access onto their broadband services. Last summer, AT&T (then SBC Communications) was the first of the two large phone companies to reduce the price dramatically--to $14.99 for the first year of service. Verizon followed a few months later with a new tier of service offering 768kbps downloads for $14.95 per month.
The price-cutting strategy has worked well for the phone companies, as they have each racked up record levels of new DSL subscribers in the months following the new promotions.
Meanwhile, cable operators have resisted national price cuts on their service. Instead, these companies continue to compete on speed. They also push the value of their service bundles, which include high-speed Internet access, telephony and television.
The phone companies are slowly assembling their own service bundle to compete with the cable operators. Verizon is using its new Fios, a fiber-to-the-home network, to offer its TV service, which is already up and running in several communities in Texas, Florida and Virginia.
AT&T, which is using a combination of fiber and VDSL technology to increase broadband speeds, is testing its TV service in Texas. It plans to roll out the service more widely later in the year.
Cable operators have responded to the phone companies' threats with some limited price cuts or supercharged broadband speeds, especially in areas where Verizon's Fios competes.
See more CNET content tagged:
price cut,
AT&T Corp.,
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cable company,
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has made statements recently about extorting money from content
providers like Yahoo, Google, MSN, Amazon and others for
highspeed to their subsribers. I am certainly not going to signup
for highspeed services with a company that artifically lowers
bandwidth to the sites I access because they haven't paid their vig
this month.
http://businessweek.com/technology/content/feb2006/tc20060202_061809.htm
It is hardly a new idea either, some companies have set up what they call "peering" agreements where they get better throughput between providers. This is how they should approach Google, Yahoo and others. Making it a value add to both the subscriber and these online service providers.
Verizon comes out saying "peered with Blizzards' World of Warcraft, have no lag while playing WoW on our DSL!" and they sure would gain some subscribers in a flash and a hurry.
I'm hoping once wireless gets more acceptable, it will add another layer of much needed competition.
reasonable competition, consider yourself lucky.
So far, it's STILL Comcast here, and I hate 'em because they're
nothing but a bunch of greedy pigs.
If any type of viable alternative comes here, I'll dump Comcast
even if it's the same pricing/service, just because I've grown to
dislike them so much.
Perhaps some year, WiMax will finally be a reality.
Chuck
Cable companies have themselves to blame for this competition too. They started to do what the Telco feared and offering phone services. You also have services that are network independant such as Vonage picking up speed. Phone carriers also have strong competition from Cellular services.
I hope that I'm not the only one who finds the return of AT&T rather amuzing given their scope of services today. :)
the telecom companies.
Why can't ATT just go ahead and set the price at 12 and 15
respectively, and leave it at that. The low price will certainly gain
ATT new DSL customers into it's fold, and more importantly,
keep them there. And it's not like ATT can't operationally justify
offering a lower price, the infrastructure for providing DSL has
long been in place, and the potential addition of subscribers will
make an already profitable service even more profitable.
But no. God forbid ATT will put anything resembling an honest
competitive deal that's a clear winner for all on the table.
Instead, the consumer, lured by the seemingly low price, will
almost certainly find out the hard way that there are strings
attached, that there are "gotchas" buried in the fine print that
effectively erase whatever low cost and savings ATT had at first
dangled in front of their nose.
ATT is betting that once it has ensnared unsuspecting DSL
consumers into their fold they will feel locked in and too lazy to
abandon the status quo and seek out better (and more honest)
alternatives from other DSL providers. Don't bet on it. It may not
be written in big bold letters in Business 101, but the last thing
you want to do is deliberately ****-off your customers. ATT may
not have the time to look at that particular, broader
consequence in the face of greedy, short term profiteering, but
maybe ATT's future churn and customer retention rate may
prove to be much needed guidance in that regard.
Then again, the way some companies work these days, maybe
not.
Management hasn't improved. Performance has not improved. But
the Marketing people are having a ball - they are the only brains
left in the company - and they probably aren't SBC/ATT employees.
Here in England, I get 16mbps for $19.00/mo The price of the broadband here is very structured and consistent.
I was surprised to find that our broadband was quite a lot cheaper than broadband in the US.
I hope you guys can get this sort of service soon