QWEST MAPS OUT A NEW ESCAPE PLAN

摘要

After nine months with Chairman and CEO Richard Notebaert at the helm, Qwest Communications has offered a glimpse of a future that will focus to a large extent on distancing itself from past sins. The RBOC's plans include expanding its meager wireless network into a national footprint, pushing its DSL service further into untapped territories, adding new IP-based offerings that target business customers―particularly large enterprises―renewing its commitment to video over DSL, and launching marketing programs designed to wrest customers back from cable companies. At this point, however, Qwest is uncertain how it's going to pull all this off. Take its wireless plan, for instance: The RBOC, which said as recently as early this year that it would sell its wireless business, freely admits that its localized CDMA network―which serves just six metro areas and about 1 million customers―is unprofitable and inadequate in the current environment. But given the enormous buildout costs of expanding into a national presence and the current state of its balance sheet, Qwest concedes that such growth is more likely to come through acquisitions or partnerships than internal effort.