DirecTV Powers Up Current Pact
By Linda Moss -- Multichannel News, 8/19/2007 8:00:00 PM
As promised this spring, DirecTV last week closed a wholesale-distribution deal with Current Group that will permit the satellite provider to offer high-speed Internet and voice services over electric power lines, starting in Texas.
DirecTV will partner with Current and use its broadband over powerline, or BPL, network beginning the end of this year or early next year. The deal will give DirecTV another option in terms of offering its customers a triple-play bundle of voice-over-Internet Protocol phone service, video and high-speed data.
Under the terms of the agreement, DirecTV will have first have access to Current's BPL network, in Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas, in an area that will cover about 1.8 million homes and businesses over the next several years.
DirecTV will be able to market a bundle that includes high-speed Internet and VoIP services, along with video, to its residential customers. In addition, the agreement gives DirecTV the option to add other geographic markets as Current builds out its network.
Back in May, DirecTV CEO Chase Carey said at a Reuters media summit that the satellite provider was looking to test BPL technology in a major city this year. DirecTV already has deals with telcos that allow it to offer a triple-play bundle, but it is investigating other options, like BPL.
DirecTV customers will be able to access the Internet by plugging a BPL modem into virtually any outlet in their home, which the satellite provider and Current claim can send data faster than the typical cable-modem service in use today.
“We are pleased to partner with DirecTV to offer them the ability to bundle their world-renowned satellite video services together with BPL high-speed Internet and VoIP services,” Current CEO Tom Casey said in a statement.
“Our agreement with Current gives our customers another high-quality, easy- to-use option to pair broadband services with DirecTV's video offerings,” Evan Grayer, DirecTV's vice president of broadband, said in a statement.
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