Comcast

Study: POTS reliability still king

Dan O'Shea — Wed, 19 Nov 2008 08:30:00 -0500

A study released earlier this month by Keynote Systems Competitive Research found that while VoIP audio quality continues to improve, VoIP is still no match for landline service reliability. At least that's what happened when Keynote pitted AT&T landline POTS against VoIP service from major cable TV providers and other telcos, including Verizon.

AT&T landline service earned the highest grade by far in service reliability, followed by VoIP offerings Time Warner Cable Digital Phone and Verizon Voicewing. Comcast Digital Voice was ranked best in audio quality, while AT&T POTS fell to third place in that category. Do the findings help the case for either landline carriers who are still losing lines by the hundreds, or VoIP carriers who are looking to move up another rung on the mainstream market ladder? It's not clear that quality has been a major factor in switching or staying with a service. For many, even VoIP may be an interim stop on the journey to completely cutting the cord for mobile.

For more:
- GigaOM has this post

Comcast, Verizon square off in Northwest

Doug Mohney — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:26:55 -0500

Comcast has announced it will roll out 50 Mbps Internet service in parts of Washington state, pitting it head-to-head with Verizon's current offerings in the region. Verizon, already planning battle in Comcast's front lawn, has a move of its own.

Oregon residents will get the benefit of Comcast's DOCSIS 3.0 technology rollout, a move driven in part by Verizon's aggressive FiOS rollout. Verizon already offers 50 Mbps service in many FiOS areas, easily trumping the stock 16 Mbps access many cable companies currently offer.

However, Verizon plans to drop the ace up its sleeve soon - a 100 Mbps offering. The company has long said the fiber-to-the-home infrastructure it was deploying was capable of at least 100 Mbps, but a combination of marketing people and backend network buildout seems to have limited Verizon from dropping The Big One - until now.

Earlier this month, Verizon submitted its paperwork for a FiOS TV cable franchise in the City of Brotherly Love - home of Comcast. Let the duopoly price wars begin!

For more:
- Comcast comes to Oregon. Article

Verizon bringing FiOS TV to Philly

Doug Mohney — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 15:34:18 -0500

The challenger, Verizon Communications, is coming to the City of Brotherly Love, against the home-town cable giant, Comcast. Lets get ready to rumblllllllllle!

More seriously, Verizon has negotiated a 15-year cable franchise deal with the city of Philadelphia. The bill has to go through hearings and City Council approval before moving forward.

Verizon says it could offer city residents FiOS TV service within a few years of getting a video franchise and expects to offer FiOS to about one-third of Philly residents within three years of government approval. Initial service areas include parts of West, North and South Philadelphia, Germantown and the Greater Northeast.

Comcast is not fazed by the potential for competition and will likely get the benefits of the ads on Comcast SportNet channel regardless of who carries it - FiOS TV already carries the channel.

Verizon has gotten some grief since it's launched FiOS mostly in wealthier towns and neighborhoods. The franchise agreement will provide up to 15 public access channels complete with financial support, franchise fees of around 5 percent of gross revenues, and four service centers.

For more:
- Philadelphia Inquirer reports that FiOS is coming to town. Article.

SPOTLIGHT: Comcast outscores telcos in broadband subs

Doug Mohney — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 16:20:09 -0400

Comcast added 382,000 new Internet subscribers in the third quarter, more than AT&T, Verizon and Qwest combined, says Dow Jones News Service.

AT&T added 148,000 subs and Qwest added 61,000 subs. Verizon added 129,000 FiOS subscribers, but its numbers are offset by a loss of 96,000 DSL customers.

Comcast's COO says that the company's management "obviously believe" that they're taking more phone and data customers from AT&T and Verizon than the two are grabbing video customers from Comcast.

Next week, Time Warner Cable and Cablevision are expected to report strong growth in their 3Q updates.

For more:
- Dow Jones compares Comcast's conquests with telco broadband numbers. Article.

Comcast profit up 38%, telephony subs rise 483K

Dan O'Shea — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 08:00:30 -0400

Cable TV company Comcast, in its third quarter earnings report, showed no signs of paying for the success that its big telco competitors experienced during the quarter. The largest cable player posted a 38 percent jump in profit to $771 million, from $560 million for the same period last year. Comcast also added 483,000 digital telephony customers.

Although it got fewer phone subscriber additions than the third quarter last year and other previous quarters, it seems clear that Comcast is benefiting from some of the consistent and severe landline loss that traditional telcos continue to experience. Comcast also said that as many as two-thirds of the 382,000 broadband customers it added during the third quarter had defected from telco DSL.

Comcast reported a 10 percent spike in revenue to $8.55 billion, though this figure was helped by higher service fees. Comcast lost 147,000 basic cable subscribers in the quarter, but gained 417,000 digital video customers.

For more:
- The Associated Press reports

Bandwidth limits bit users

Doug Mohney — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 16:51:32 -0400

If you think Comcast is the only service provider limiting access to bandwidth, think again. Clearwire and Qwest also have fine print "terms of use" policies that a small fraction of customers have experienced.

Customers have run afoul of terms-of-use policies in downloading full length movies and games. At Clearwire, first connection speeds start to slow, forcing customers to call customer service to reset a connection. Customers engaging in "excessive downloading" get terminated but not before receiving several warnings, says the broadband provider.

Qwest provides three warnings to residential DSL customers who have usage habits that are "hundreds of times" normal usage. According to the company, such warnings are given to about .002 percent of its 2.5 million customer base.

Consumer advocates say that vague policies mislead customers as to the amount of access they truly have, while Qwest says Internet technology evolves too quickly for them to specify a figure of abuse, and is only a small percentage of customers are "extreme users."

In justifying its 250 GB/month cap, Comcast says most users don't use more than two to three GB per month, while Clearwire and Qwest say they are only concerned about how much customers use, not how they might use the bandwidth.

For more:
- Yakima Herald reports on Qwest, Clearwire bandwidth management policies. Article.

Cox Communications plans wireless rollout

Dan O'Shea — Mon, 27 Oct 2008 09:22:27 -0400

Cable TV company Cox Communications reportedly is announcing today that it's building its own wireless facilities and will launch service next year, following through on intentions that Cox president Patrick Esser briefly discussed in a public speech over the summer. Cox acquired more than $300 million worth of 700 Mhz spectrum at auction earlier this year, and Esser earlier had said the company would spend more than $500 million on wireless spectrum.

Its current license covers existing Cox cable TV market areas around Atlanta, New Orleans, San Diego, Omaha, Neb., and Las Vegas, as well as much of Kansas and southern New Mexico, according to a report from the Associated Press. It will partner with Sprint on roaming outside of those markets.

Cox formerly operated wireless properties in California and Las Vegas, but sold them to Sprint in 1999. Cox and other cable firms later partnered with Sprint on a wireless joint venture, but the project fell apart within the last year. Other cable TV partners in that project, including Comcast, have since joined Sprint in the new Clearwire joint venture focused on WiMAX.

It is not yet clear how much more money Cox will need to invest to get its wireless networks up and running, or what business model the company plans to rely on, though it probably is safe to say it will bundle wireless with cable TV and other existing services. The company does have the advantage in its current cable markets of being able to use its own fiber network for mobile backhaul where applicable.

For more:
The Associated Press has this report

Comcast's cyber commando customer service team

Doug Mohney — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 16:55:29 -0400

Comcast customers complaining through non-traditional means (i.e. blogging) are being heard by a seven person "cyberteam" scouring the web for public complaints about company service.

While Comcast still ranks near the bottom of customer satisfaction surveys, the guerilla support effort is starting to sooth the savage postings of publicly disgruntled customers. The web team checks blogs, tech web sites, Twitter and other social networking sites, consumer sites and YouTube - yes, even video postings.

Comcast reps track down customers by matching clues in postings to the company's internal database of customer phone numbers and email. If they can't directly track down a person, they may post a note directly in a blog.

It's a tough job. The team only reaches 10 percent of customers who complain online, but has influenced at least one high-profile griper. Bob Garfield has handed off his ComcastMustDie.com site to another group, and the focus will expand to complaints about a broader range of companies.

For more:
- MSN.com/AP on Comcast's cyber complaint team. Story.

Honorable Mention

Pete Wylie — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 09:43:28 -0400

And the honorable mentions go to...

SureWest Communications, still pushing hard with IPTV, EBIF and other campaigns amid all the pressures of being a small wireline telco.

Telus, the Canadian IP carrier which adopted HPNA recently and actually raised its revenue outlook.

Cablevision, pushing into Wi-Fi, re-booting its RS-DVR service and acquiring Newsday in the face of new competition from Verizon.

Comcast, representative of cable's Tru2way and DOCSIS 3.0 ambitions, and investing in WiMAX, all while resolving its traffic management issues.

Panhandle Telephone Cooperative, Inc (PTCI), another small telco making a big splash with HDTV, and eyeing plenty of new IPTV applications.

Comcast speed & price increases in pipeline

Doug Mohney — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 23:09:38 -0400

Comcast employees apparently didn't get the Apple Computer Zip-it training, because they're talking about new speed tiers and pricing to rollout in several markets over the next few weeks.

Employees dishing to DSLReports say the 6 Mbps/1 Mbps (download/upload rates) subscribers who pay $42.95 per month will get double the speed to 12 Mbps/2 Mbps, while customers currently getting 8 Mbps/2Mbps at $52.95 per month will soon get 16 Mbps/2 Mbps. There will be no cost for the FiOS-competitive upgrades, and Comcast is keeping their $24.95/month economy 768Kbps/384kbps service.

DOCSIS 3.0-based packages will offer 22 Mbps/5 Mbps service for $62.95 - and speed might get up to 30 Mbps when Comcast's Powerboost technology is added into the equation, say sources. At the top of the mountain is a 50 Mbps/10 Mbps package that could come in as low as $135.95 per month. The so-called "Extreme 50" package may also bundle into a customer's existing services for $100 more a month.

"For the time being," all tiers also come with Comcast's 250GB monthly bandwidth cap. They will also be subject to the company's bandwidth management system that temporarily puts heavy users into a slower QoS if the local node is seeing congestion or if the users are taking up more than 70 percent of their allotted throughput.

Comcast should have a new website for the faster speeds within the next few weeks. Users can do the standard zip code query to see if their neighborhood has been upgraded to DOCSIS 3.0. Comcast says it will upgrade 20 percent of its footprint to 3.0 by the end of the year and 100 percent of its markets by the end of 2010.

For more:
- DSLReports reports on new Comcast speeds, prices

A month after Ike, Galveston telecom restoration continues.

Doug Mohney — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 09:58:37 -0400

A month after Hurricane Ike rolled over Galveston and much of Southeast Texas, thousands of residents are still waiting for electricity, and some are still without landline phone service, cable or Internet.

Local utilities AT&T, CenterPoint Energy, Texas Gas Service and Comcast met at Galveston City Hall on Monday to give updates on service restoration and the challenges that remain.

AT&T reports it had completely restored services everywhere except on the barrier islands, including Galveston. The company's infrastructure on Galveston was "heavily damaged," and officials aren't sure how many people need service restored. AT&T is prioritizing the restoration of service to buildings that are occupied, have power and are "ready to receive service."

Comcast reports it has restored service to about 50 percent of its island customers; the number may be higher, but some people have not returned to their properties to turn on their TVs and computers. Comcast's underground infrastructure sustained "severe damage" from the storm and lack of commercial power in some areas is also a problem. The company is running generators at 50 places on the island where the system needs to draw power, and generators must be manned at all times to prevent theft or other incidents.

Comcast projects full restoration of its Galveston network in three weeks, except for some "isolated cases of outages" where a cable drop from pole to house is still not repaired.

For more:
- The Galveston County Daily News reports Galveston telecom restoration after Ike.

SPOTLIGHT: Comcast gives free cable with Internet or phone service

Doug Mohney — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 22:01:37 -0400

Cable-provider Comcast has decided to ride the coattails of the digital TV transition by offering free basic cable for 12 months for customers who sign up for at least one other Comcast service.

New users can get basic cable (20 to 30 channels) without other services for $10 a month.

Will Verizon's next chess move be to offer free basic phone service with FiOS? Don't laugh; VoIP pundits have been saying that voice on a high speed data network is effectively "free" for quite some time.

For more:
- Checkout the story at Home Media Magazine, a Questex publication

Patent ruling due in Verizon lawsuit against Cox

Dan O'Shea — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 09:08:30 -0400

Verizon Communications is awaiting a jury decision in its VoIP patent lawsuit against Cox Communications, and that ruling could come as soon as today, according to The Wall Street Journal. Verizon sued Cox over the alleged violation of six VoIP-related patents, and the action is just one of a series of similar accusations Verizon has leveled, including patent violation claims against VoIP service provider Vonage and cable TV firm Charter Communications.

The Vonage case was settled with an agreement that Vonage would pay Verizon $117.5 million. The lawsuit against Charter is pending. Verizon is seeking damages of $404 million from Cox. The WSJ reports that Verizon previously struck a deal with Comcast under which the two companies agreed not to sue one another for at least five years, if Comcast agreed to buy Verizon Wireless service for its employees. As cable TV companies continue to win over telephony subscribers, Verizon is looking to get its piece of the action one way or another.

For more:
- read this report at The Wall Street Journal

Deprived Houston Comcast customers grow grumpy

Doug Mohney — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 09:50:35 -0400

Most Comcast customers in the Houston area have their service back after Hurricane Ike, but those who don't can't get an answer out of the cable provider as to when they'll be up again.

About 93 percent of Comcast's 750,000 customers in the Houston area are back on line, but the other 7 percent are still without cable, phone and/or Internet service. Comcast says they continue to find severed drop lines to individual customers, due to either tree or water damage.

In some cases customers can get estimates on when their neighborhoods will be restored. With technicians working around the clock to restore service, Comcast is focusing its repairs on segments that affect the most people - network backbone first, then nodes, with drop lines last.

For more:
- Houston Chronicle talks to deprived Comcast customers. Article.

Related articles
AT&T works on Ike restoration
Hanna, Gustav, now Ike

Samsung replaces NSN in Xohm Dallas launch

Dan O'Shea — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 22:45:00 -0400

Sprint's Xohm WiMAX network launched this week in Baltimore, but the lesser-known Xohm-related story out of WiMAX World in Chicago is that Samsung has replaced Nokia Siemens Networks as the vendor for the Xohm network in Dallas. Telephony reports that Sprint chose to move forward with Samsung--its vendor for East Coast markets--in Dallas because doing so will allow it to accelerate its market launch.

Sprint and NSN both are saying that NSN is still a key Xohm vendor. NSN's WiMAX gear is still undergoing production. NSN came in as thir surprise third vendor choice for Xohm well after Samsung and Motorola were already part of the team.

For more:
- check out this coverage at Telephony

Camiant, Sandvine play on Comcast's traffic team

Dan O'Shea — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 15:28:00 -0400

Comcast's new two-tiered approach to managing broadband traffic uses technology from both its existing deep packet inspection vendor Sandvine and new policy server partner Camiant. The second vendor's solution is key to the second tier of Comcast's approach, where heavy traffic users have their traffic placed at a lower priority during peak traffic time .

Sandvine announced last week that Comcast was using its Fairshare management solution to help the carrier analyze network congestion levels. Comcast also is using an as-yet-unnamed vendor for its Internet protocol detail record (IPDR)server, which also is important to its new traffic management strategy. Camiant's server collects information from the IPDR server to help identify which traffic is to be given lower priority.

In related news, Sandvine also said it is working with three new carrier customers in Latin America.

For more:
- see this story at Telephony
- read this post at BroadbandReports

Comcast sends new network management plan to FCC

Dan O'Shea — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 09:50:36 -0400

The Federal Communications Commission last month ordered Comcast to develop within 30 days a new plan for managing network traffic that would not punish users of specific bandwidth-intensive applications, such as peer-to-peer applications. With the clock winding down late Friday, Comcast filed its new approach with the FCC.

Comcast plans to analyze heaviest traffic connections during peak network usage times and reroute those users to a secondary traffic stream that will have lower priority on the network. The network operator said its tests of that method in five cities over three months yielded no customer complaints, and that less than 1 percent of its customers on average were affected on a daily basis.

Comcast plans to roll out this revised network management strategy nationally by the end of this year, and if this approach is successful, other network operators probably will pursue similar plans. At the same time, many broadband service providers are eying metered usage and usage-based pricing plans, but will those measures really be necessary to management strategies? Or will they simply be a way for carriers to better milk their broadband connections for more revenue?

For more:
- see this story at The Wall Street Journal

Cable's push and prayer for WiMAX

Doug Mohney — Thu, 11 Sep 2008 16:38:30 -0400

From all indications, the Clearwire/Xohm WiMAX merger deal should be completed by the end of the year. Cable operators are eager to get the ability to bundle wireless services with their current triple play offerings, but may have a limited window of opportunity to exploit a WiMAX offering.

Comcast and Time Warner put out large sums to invest in the "new" Clearwire, so both companies are eager to take advantage of a nationwide broadband network. The master theory is to keep customers from straying or dropping TV, phone and internet services by reselling cable-branded phone and wireless broadband services from Clearwire. If a customer has the opportunity to buy cable-branded/bundled wireless phone service, they are less likely to pick up VoIP/landline-esque service - and also have less of an opportunity to migrate to wireless broadband services (and off of broadband cable).

How much of an advantage cable companies might have is subject to debate. Wireless phone carriers have stated their intention to migrate to LTE-based services as rapidly as possible, but their deployment pacing may be based upon the relative success - or failure - of WiMAX and Clearwire.

For more:
- Ars Technica discusses cable's newfound WiMAX embrace. Article

TWC won't throw down DOCSIS 3.0 blanket

Dan O'Shea — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 23:31:00 -0400

DOCSIS 3.0 has been seen as the cable TV industry's answer to big-bandwidth fiber networks, with speed potential from 50 Mbps to well beyond 100 Mbps. Comcast, Charter Communications, Time Warner Cable and other cable TV operators have been testing the technology and have committed to deploy it. This week, TWC chief operating officer Landel Hobbs said at a conference in California that his company's strategy will be to deploy DOCSIS 3.0 "surgically" in markets where it is most needed, but not in markets where the company is finding support for its tiered broadband services.

With big telcos Verizon Communications and AT&T pushing fiber aggressively into new markets, you would expect to see a major cable player blanket markets with its own next-generation broadband solution as quickly as possible. It will be interesting to see what competitors and TWC's "have-not" customers make of this plan.

For more:
- see this report at Multichannel News

A brewing customer service war

Doug Mohney — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 17:25:05 -0400

In Delaware (and likely other parts of the country), Comcast and Verizon duke it out over who provides better customer service, with the cable company working on improving its story and image, while Verizon offers FiOS to take away TV customers.

Both customers have opened up new area customer service centers -- Comcast in Christiana, Del., and Verizon in Philly - and both are adding on more employees. Comcast has hired 15,000 customer service employees and techs in the last 18 months; Verizon isn't saying how many bodies it has added nationwide.

Ranked last in customer satisfaction in recent surveys, Comcast has added an expanded training program and new technology for customer service agents and field technicians. The company is evaluating "every element within our service network" from top to bottom to identify issues and resolve them.

By keeping support operations local, Comcast expects customers to be able to relate to the support people on the phones.

Verizon, on the other hand, may direct FiOS customers to any one of 13 offices around the country for technical support. Still, customers who have switched from one service to another complain about long wait times on customer service lines.

For more:
- Delaware Online on the Comcast vs. Verizon customer service perception battle. Article

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