CIBC World Markets screws the ISPs over NPNT by justin Wednesday 28-Mar-2001 According to this Dow Jones article, Canadian Imperial Bank Commerce (CIBC World Markets) is one of the creditor banks who showed such avarice in moving the network ransom figure quoted to ISPs higher by the hour in todays failed negotiations. CIBC also recommended investors "hold" the now worthless NorthPoint stock as late as October last year. Banks in Canada are rather like telcos are in the US: big, and frequently ugly.
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 | | 500k subscribers...? said by DowJones:
Harry Taxin, chief executive of consortium member MegaPath Networks Inc. of Pleasanton, Calif., said he wouldn't be surprised if subscribers start losing DSL access Wednesday or Thursday. NorthPoint has just over 100,000 customer lines, which serve an estimated 500,000 customers.
well, I suppose you could extrapolate a 1:5 ratio;/
managment network went dark this afternoon, so as far as the NCC is concerned it's all pretty much in the carriers hands- the board is in alarm;]
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|  |  justinAustralian
join:1999-05-28
New York, NY
kudos:7 | Re: 500k subscribers...? could be true - a lot of lines went into smaller companies with 2-32 sized networks. Most residential households must even average at 3.5 customers (you, your spouse and 1.5 kids).. | |
| | | donaldkPremium
join:2000-10-19
Thunder Bay, ON Reviews:
 ·Eastlink Cable
|  CIBC is very very dumb
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| | Dead in Seattle!
Peace
Deano | |
| | | | xy375
join:2001-02-17
Denver, CO | My DSL through Telocity/Northpoint hasn't gone dead yet. There is no way in hell I am going to AT&T. I'll just have to wait for another CLEC. I hope Rhythms picks up my line. | |
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JPCass
join:2001-01-23
Denver, CO | CIBC, big and ugly
...which they apparently had an interest in.
If there is cosmic justice, the AT&T sale won't go through - FCC problems or whatever - and the banks, after holding out for more, will end up with almost nothing. AT&T would be just the sort of player to make a bid that they knew if it wouldn't go through, would at least provide them the strategic benefit of taking out a lot of competition. | |
| |  vrangel
join:2000-08-11
Spring Valley, NY |  Re: CIBC, big and ugly
in fact tells you to sell the stock.
Analysts rarely use actual 'sell' because of brokerage
business implications.
'Buy' recommendation is a true hold.
And only a 'strong buy' is actually a buy. | |
| | | justinAustralian
join:1999-05-28
New York, NY
kudos:7 | Re: CIBC, big and ugly they issues BUY in august, with a 12 month price target of $22. | |
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| | ISP Group Blasts Northpoint over Funding from cnet.com...
An eleventh-hour effort to keep bankrupt NorthPoint Communications' high-speed Internet network running for another 30 days has apparently failed, according to a coalition of companies that resell the company's broadband service.
As a result, customers of NorthPoint will likely see DSL service disruptions.
Telocity, an Internet service provider serving residential consumers, led a group of more than a dozen ISPs in negotiations with NorthPoint. The talks were intended to minimize potential problems for current customers as NorthPoint nears its demise.
Last week, AT&T purchased NorthPoint's assets in a bankruptcy court sale. Ma Bell plans to acquire NorthPoint's assets, forcing NorthPoint's ISP resellers to find a new DSL provider such as Covad Communications or others.
The ISP coalition said it agreed to pay $2.4 million to keep NorthPoint's DSL (digital subscriber line) network running for another 30 days. But Telocity said that after a week of negotiations, NorthPoint's bankers alerted the ISPs Tuesday that the sum is insufficient to fund the network operations for the next month. In addition, NorthPoint will not guarantee the network's operation for the next month, while the ISPs seek alternative DSL providers, Telocity said.
"After a week of good faith negotiations, NorthPoint and its team of bankers last night decided to significantly escalate the amount of funds necessary to keep the network up for a period of time," Ned Hayes, chief financial officer at Telocity, said in a statement. "It seems that NorthPoint's bankers want the ISPs to pay an unreasonable amount of money for the network staying up prospectively as well as retroactively."
NorthPoint representatives could not immediately be reached for comment. An AT&T spokesperson also could not immediately be reached for comment. | |
| | | |  Re: ISP Group Blasts Northpoint over Funding
... customers of NorthPoint will likely see DSL service disruptions. "Service disruptions?" "Service disruptions?!?!" 100,000+ customers going down is "service disruptions?" Hello? Geez. That's a bit like calling death an "illness." Fer cryin' out loud, c|net, get a clue!
--
Jim Seymour & Karel the Computer Cat
Agents Provocateurs Extraordinaire
irc://irc.dal.net/#dslreports | |
| | | justinAustralian
join:1999-05-28
New York, NY
kudos:7 | Re: ISP Group Blasts Northpoint over Funding yeah I cracked a grim twisted smile when I saw those words..
ford explorer customers driving at high speed in hot
weather on bridgestone tires may experience some disruptions to the horizontal attitude of their vehicles. | |
|
mcaslan
join:2000-06-17
Baltimore, MD
| Greed for money not building a company.... This is further proof that Liz Fetter was in the process of building stock value for herself and her executive officers rather than building a company with a product. Her greed and lack of vision to wind down her biggest failure of many in her career will hopefully provide her cronies with less cash than they ever could have imagined.
They are mediocre worthless business people and greedy rotters as ever there were...
Never can I say they were true business people as others seem to indicate, they have engaged in the most massive of failures, their business and strategies shambles. I as an employer would never let them near any company that I wanted to keep running.
Liz, can I suggest you phone Firestone, RJR, or maybe one of the major political parties for a job.
[text was edited by author 2001-03-28 23:28:24] | |
| | | DSL- walk softly and carry a big stick The death of northpoint is just another mile marker on this crazy highway called DSL.
Does anyone get the feeling that this industry got off the ground before it could really fly?
Does anyone remember when the phone company monopoly was "broken?" Ha.
The DSL industry has been rotting from the inside for a long time (day one?) - The major carriers had a vision of nationwide, high speed networks for less. And with less price comes more consumers, right?
Next scene - NP (or your carrier here) and some knuckle-headed "businessmen" who were starting up ISP's, take all the millions of VC money and start spreading it around. What do they spend it on? Advertising anywhere and everywhere, regardless of availability - and outlandish commissions for the sales folks at ISP's to sell the product if the customer "is breathing."
The idea being - as it was in those dizzy headed days - get a chunk of market share and name recognition and you'll be the next AOL . D'oh.
One major problem was - the phone companies still existed. Yes, friendly Verizon, SBC or whoever would gladly take your order for a loop delivery - and promptly blow off the appointments three times before cutting your normal phone service . "By the way... did you know you can get this service right from us Mr. Consumer? Here, take a pamphlet and you'll come around."
Also, keep in mind the fact that line-sharing didnt get up and running with carriers until fall of last year. Again, baby bells were making it quite difficult while driving customers away from DSL wholesalers and ISP's.
On top of these wonderful market conditions - companies (ISps) in general seemed to have lost all practical business sense or got caught daydreaming about how everything "will be better once they clear the hump." ISPs drove for sales that they could not provision in an attempt to capture customers. in addition, with all of the pitfalls in the installation process the idea seemed to be - "keep filling the bucket and eventually we'll get a lot of customers, regardless of the leaks". The majority of provisioning systems for companies (ISP-CLEC/CLEC-ILEC) were downright archaic - which added more stress to the whole process.
Add to this the ever dropping price wars which had ISP's eating hardware and installation costs like Dom Deloise at the all-you-can-eat buffet.
What do you get - the Venture Capitalists finally wake up from the "we dont care if it turns a profit" party and have a hell of a shock. So, funding is pulled just when ISP's are turning it around and getting some real solutions in place. You know the story from there....ISP's cant pay the bills and close down, next comes the CLECs. Goodnight folks.
And what are we left with? A few greasy California ISP CEO's and presidents looking for new jobs, some cheap office space for rent and the phone companies sitting pretty as they merge back together. I'd say this proves two things -
1. The last 2 years or so of frivolous spending by all the DSL ISp's and CLEC's have served to do one thing - bring up public awareness and desire for a product which is now mostly provided (with some notable exceptions) by the ILEc's. "Thanks for all your hard work guys - we'll take over from here."
2. Breaking up a monopoly is not such a easy little thing. Not in principle nor in practice. You can try, but eventually the government administrations change and public attention shifts. The remaining bodies left after a break up are still present - and because they were an essential part of the respective industry, they can still wield their power to make it more than difficult for young upstarts. What to do? Well, I don't think we have the answer just yet - more informed public discussion on a national stage is necessary.
Thank you for reading this (if you did) - i'm just glad to get it all out after working in DSL for 2 years and seeing it all hit the fan. Just leads me to think - While we were laughing at the baby bells for not being "on top of the game" and too big/slow - who was laughing at us? ......damn. | |
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| All that's left AT&T ILEC'S AOL/TW
Looks like that's all that's gonna be left.
A surf through AT&T's site today revealed a few things.
Project Angel Rolled out in San Antonio TX last week (Fixed Wireless providing Broadband TV and phone)
AT&T broadband cable and their affiliates (looks like they held on to all the FCC would allow)
Couldn't help noticing the MASSIVE suits against ILEC's to pave the way to opening up the competition
here »www.att.com/press/item/0,1354,3725,00.html
and here »www.att.com/press/item/0,1354,3724,00.html
All released the same day they bought Northpoint's equipment.
Couldn't miss this one either »www.att.com/press/item/0,1354,3718,00.html
Check out the 4th paragraph, do I smell a rat?
AT&T now offers DSL at the lowest rate (34.95/mo) when bundled with other goodies.
Looks like Ma Bell is back with a vengeance. I would like to see how the Feds/FCC accept this not to mention the ILEC's
[text was edited by author 2001-03-29 06:06:28]
[text was edited by author 2001-03-29 06:08:24]
[text was edited by author 2001-03-29 06:09:56]
Sorry for all the edits. Bug in DSLR program, Check out Betsy's pic. Might make a good dart board
[text was edited by author 2001-03-29 06:12:10]
[text was edited by author 2001-03-29 06:14:38] | |
| | | Anon | Re: All that's left Check out Betsy's pic. Might make a good dart board
Wow, that's one homely-looking gal! | |
| | | | Anon | Re: All that's left said by skiphreac:
Check out Betsy's pic. Might make a good dart board
Wow, that's one homely-looking gal!
ROFLMAO!!!!!!!!!
Dat sum cold hard chit, mang. | |
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