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wtansill
Ncc1701
join:2000-10-10
Falls Church, VA | Gee, what a surprise
Bondholders may force a shutdown to maximize their profits, yet there is absolutely no protection for the millions of subscribers who've put up their hard-earned dollars for service that they will likely never see. | |
mattman
join:1999-10-25
Lafayette Hill, PA
| Well, I don't think its their profits they are trying to maximize their profits, because, there are none. What the bondholders are trying to do is minimze their loses since each day @home is running, the more money they are losing. Thats what bondholders typically do, and they have a lot more say than the shareholders, which have zero say right now.
Matt | |
NetworkJoe
@splitrock.net
| Actually, as of the recent renegotiation of the @home contracts with cox, att, etc, they're making money again.
The bondholders are mad because they want their money back, and the ATT deal is not profitable for them. It's a reasonable position for them to take, i guess, but they're going to screw a lot of people on the off chance that selling @home, router by router and switch by switch, might make them more money than a big lump sum.
Incidentally, if they do that, i forsee new problems for cisco etc. why buy new when you can get it at a firesale? 
refs:
»www.internetnews.com/isp-news/ar···,00.html
»www.dotcomscoop.com/athm.html
nj | |
spamd
Premium
join:2001-04-22
Rockford, IL | reply to wtansill
Here is what Insight@home is telling us. Go to the link
»www.insight-com.com/net/UPDATES | |
STEVECH
join:2001-02-25
Mimbres, NM
| reply to NetworkJoe
It's not just the bond holders, there are a bunch of stockholders that paid out of their own pockets also filed suit. The argument is pretty simple, AT&T offered 307 million for @Home, and the latest count is @Home has 4.17 million users and growing, that works out to be less than $100 per user acquisition, not to mention any hard assets, and since AT&T is the majority shareholder and controls the board, the suits merely argues that AT&T, rather than trying to pursue profit and grow the company, it undermines the company and buy it for a song, and the ONLY way to realize/unlock the true value of @Home is to shut it down and see whether AT&T is right (that it only worth $307M) or the bondholders/shareholders. BTW, the suits also want to renegotiate terms of @Home's debt (kind of a popular thing in the post dot-com days) and eventually kick AT&T out and have @Home operate as an independent company. | |
Homebrew1994
Betzwood Basement Brewery
join:2001-11-15
King Of Prussia, PA
| reply to wtansill
said by wtansill:
Bondholders may force a shutdown to maximize their profits, yet there is absolutely no protection for the millions of subscribers who've put up their hard-earned dollars for service that they will likely never see.
We subscribers paid our hard earned dollars for a service that we have been receiving. We will lose no money, only the luxury of broadband.
The bondholders and other creditors have the right to do whatever they legally can to minimize the bleeding of cash from @Home (and the possible fire-sale to ATT) so they can get partially repaid.
It is nice to think that the judge will feel sory for the 4mm subscribers losing their broadband, but I will not hold my breath for it. It is not like they are looking to shut off electricity or water service. High speed internet is not essential for life.
I really do hope that things work out for us and the cable light on my rented RCA modem stays lit, but I am not counting on it. Heck, the way my Comcast (Montgomery county, PA) connection has been running at night lately, a 56k connection will seem perfectly normal. I'll bank the $50 a month until they come back on line with something else.
Good Luck to All | |
djrobx
join:2000-05-31
Valencia, CA
 ·PHONE POWER
 ·AT&T U-Verse
·AT&T CallVantage
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 ·RoadRunner Cable
| reply to STEVECH
I don't think they're going to be "Unlocking" anything.
It seems to me they're making damn sure that @home is worthless. They better hope they can make more than $307 million on an equipment firesale, because that's all they're going to get if they follow through with this stupid stunt. I think the fact that nobody has made a better offer than AT&T is telling.
They've already ruined consumer confidence in the @home name. All they've done is proved once and for all that the cable MSOs should not rely on third party ISPs. Now they've forced them all to find alternative means (Comcast and Cox were preparing to do this anyway). If the cable companies can pull it off (AT&T is a backbone provider and already has an ISP for god sakes, not to mention it has a nicely functioning cable network from their MediaOne acquisition), there will be no further need for @home to exist. Those 4 million subscribers won't mean squat.
Dumb, dumb, dumb...
-- Rob | |
STEVECH
join:2001-02-25
Mimbres, NM
| Right now is a game of chicken, from what I've read, the bond holders are owed a collective of some $750M, so assuming that they won't get all of the $307M (minus expenses, etc), you are talking about probably 30 cents for a dollar, in so far as bankruptcy is concerned, it could be a lot worse (ask the Enron bond holders  ).
Now we can say it's all the bond holders' fault and they are willing to screw the users, however, as far as I know, AT&T and others haven't given an inch either, and it looks like everybody's willing to stare down to the end and banking on even if they collectively (AT&T, et al and bond guys) pull the plug, they can absolve whatever consumer confidence that they may suffer as a result.
By the way, according to the CNET article, AT&T is in the worse shape, as they have the most users (3Million +) from @Home, and the least buildup for taking customer off @Home. The Mediaone buyout does not help them as they have not had the infrastructure to utilize those pipes as data pipes. For example, I have AT&T cable in my city forever, but we still have no cable internet access, it was supposed to be online in Sept 1999!!!
The question is how have we ever come to this, it's not just the home casual users, there are schools, people that do business on EBay, etc and just small businesses that rely on their internet access. Now all these people will potentially be jeopedized. The worst part is this is not the first time this happens, we've all seen this movie before with Flashnet, Northpoint, etc. | |
MickiDaMouse
join:2001-02-26
El Paso, TX | You sound pretty knowledgable on the topic. You're not one of the bondholder's lawyers, are you? If so, do me a favor...tell them to LEAVE MY CONNECTION ALONE!!!
Snail-Modem = Poo. | |
STEVECH
join:2001-02-25
Mimbres, NM
| reply to wtansill
NO, I am not involved, my brother and my sister's families are both on @Home, not to mention a bunch of friends and I just completed a transaction on EBay that the other party has an @Home account (I would be REAL hesitant to do business with anybody on EBay that uses @Home right now, as email is the only way to correspond). I have some interest in this as when I was look for BB in summer of 99, I called both PacBell and @Home and @Home told me then that just wait till Sept (99!!), luckily, I did not wait and gone with PacBell. Over the past two years, my DSL worked great but there were billing problems that really tested my patience and I keep checking back with @Home to see if they are finally ready, but NO, so consider myself lucky . | |
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