SBC Communications wants to get naked—with digital service lines, that is. The company will start testing naked DSL – lines sold without requiring the customer to buy local telephone service from the same carrier – during the summer in select locations, the company confirmed last week.
Chief financial officer Rich Lindner reportedly told analysts at an investment conference that he expected the company to launch the trials of naked DSL bundled especially with wireless service, according to the DSL Prime newsletter.
More exact details about the SBC trials and where they'll be done have not yet been disclosed. But published reports indicated the SBC move comes as naked DSL becomes a more heated topic of debate, in light of SBC and Verizon planning to merge to the numbers one and two U.S. long distance providers, AT&T and MCI, respectively.
Separating DSL from local phone service could prove a key factor in whether the SBC/AT&T and Verizon/MCI mergers get approval from federal regulators, the reports said, noting that SBC, Verizon, and other companies got a break when the Federal Communications Commission ruled state regulators can't force the so-called Baby Bells to separate DSL from any other services
Consumer advocacy groups have been reported saying those mergers, if consummated, would be bad for consumers because of limited choice as a result. But the companies have countered that cable operators and Voice-over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephone services have brought in new and more broad competition.
The consumer groups have countered that VoIP isn't a true competitor to traditional phone companies because they require customers to buy traditional service as well as DSL.
Qwest—whose bid to merge MCI was beaten by Verizon—began selling naked DSL several months ago, the reports continued, with Verizon letting voice customers drop landlines as long as they port phone numbers to other voice services like cell phones or VoIP. But Verizon still won't let new DSL customers buy high-speed broadband without a Verizon phone line, however.
