Telecom firms expand here

A national player in the Internet service arena has entered the Milwaukee market, while two telecommunications providers have expanded their markets here, one entering downtown Milwaukee, and a Milwaukee-based technology company has expanded its telecommunications services.
EarthLink has launched EarthLink High Speed Internet service to consumers within the Time Warner Cable, Milwaukee Division service area. EarthLink High Speed Internet service is available now to approximately 750,000 households in Time Warner’s Milwaukee service area.
“Bringing high-speed Internet choice to Milwaukee cable customers for the first time is the culmination of many years of hard work and the exemplary cooperation of Time Warner Cable,” said Tom Andrus, vice president of products and services at EarthLink, which is headquartered in Pasadena, Calif.
“Customers in Milwaukee can enjoy Time Warner Cable’s high-speed cable modem Internet service through an expanded choice of ISPs,” said Tom Sharrard, president of Time Warner Cable, Milwaukee Division. “We’re proud to be among the first in the nation to provide consumers more ISP choices with the convenience of a super fast connection that never requires dialing-in or waiting.”
Initial pricing is $41.95 for speeds up to 2 Mbps downstream and 384 Kbps upstream.
Earthlink (www.earthlink.net), has more than 406,000 high-speed subscribers nationwide.
In another Internet-related service expansion, Roman TechNet, a Division of Roman Electric Co. in Milwaukee (www.romantechnet.com.), now offers businesses a system for high-speed Internet access using existing telephone wiring.
The technology gives hotels, motels, resorts, apartment complexes, festivals, carnivals and other businesses a “plug-and-play” system. Users plug their computer into a converter, the converter into a telephone jack, and obtain instant Internet access.
TechNet specialists install cross-connect wiring to interrupt the signal between the telephone service provider and individual jacks. Then, using the cross-connects, they put their specialized server and switching technology in the loop. The system enables the network signal to run on top of the telephone cable at a frequency that does not interfere with telephone use.
As long as users have an ethernet card and TCP/IP protocol (common to Internet use) on their computer, they can simply plug into the Internet and use the business’s T1 line or DSL for high-speed access. With the use of existing telephone wiring there is a bandwidth restriction of 1 MBit per connection.
Meanwhile, TDS Metrocom, a Wisconsin-based telecommunications provider, has expanded its reach in southeastern Wisconsin to include local voice, data, and DSL Internet service to downtown Milwaukee, Menomonee Falls, Butler, Hales Corners, Franklin and Cudahy.
The move into the downtown Milwaukee market is a first for the company, which previously had focused solely on suburban markets.
Matt Loch, vice president of sales for Metrocom, said the expansion is in response to demands from the markets and to turbulence in the market. “We believe we can be a positive, stabilizing force in this particular area of technology,” he said. “The Milwaukee market has seen some problems with high-speed Internet access and local phone service because of start-up companies that offered connections, signed up customers, and then, because they didn’t have the financial wherewithal, closed their doors, leaving customers in the cold.”
TDS has been serving Waukesha, the southern Milwaukee suburbs, and Racine and Kenosha, along with other areas of the state, Illinois and Michigan.
Verizon Wireless has also expanded service, with eight new cell sites in Wisconsin. The expansion is part of the company’s $4 billion investment in network improvements nationwide in 2001, $25 million of which was dedicated to its Wisconsin network.
The new sites are intended to enhance coverage in the following communities: