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AT&T steps up BT deal
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November 11, 1998: 8:58 a.m. ET
Telecom leader will market Concert global services for multinational clients
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - AT&T Corp., looking to galvanize an $11 billion joint venture with British Telecommunications PLC unveiled in July, launched an aggressive push Wednesday to market an array of voice, data and Internet protocol services to U.S.- based multinational clients.
For AT&T, the move marks a stepped-up effort to build its international communications business at a time when its industry nemesis, the newly created MCI WorldCom Inc., is reaching out to global clients over its own "On-Net" network.
AT&T views its deal with BT, announced July 27, as a vehicle by which America's biggest telecom company can gain broader access to the burgeoning European market. At the same time, BT has high hopes of establishing a toehold in the coveted North American market, which it lost when its proposed merger with MCI Corp. collapsed.
Under the alliance, for which regulatory approval still is pending, the companies plan to combine their existing networks, all of their international traffic and their multinational accounts in selected industry sectors. They also will develop an Internet Protocol-based (IP) network to support such services as global electronic commerce and other Internet-based operations.
Wednesday's announcement marks the first serious effort to bring some of these goals to fruition.
AT&T said it intends to market a suite of six services to corporate clients under the label AT&T Concert Services. BT acquired Concert, an international voice and data-transmission service, from MCI in September, BT and MCI had collaborated to create the company nearly four years earlier with the intent of using it to promote multinational telecom business once their merger was complete.
When MCI reneged on the merger plans, however, Concert suddenly was left without a distributor in the United States, the world's largest telecom market.
Robert Annunziata, president of AT&T's business services unit, is said to be considering boosting his sales force by as many as 1,000 reps to market the Concert services in the U.S. Annuziata has estimated the U.S. market for multinational corporate clients at 10 million.
Concert currently serves more than 4,000 customers, some of which MCI may have hopes of retaining.
The options to be provided by AT&T Concert include frame relay service offering special international calling packages to 40 countries with simplified pricing and contract processes, and automated teller machine service starting in the second quarter of 1999.
AT&T also will provide multinational customers with a new "Concert InternetPlus" service featuring centralized purchasing, a single bill and availability in 15 countries outside the U.S.
Planning also is under way to integrate the two carriers' network facilities and deploy an IP-based network connecting 100 cities around the world, AT&T said.
The venture's public network will extend to 237 countries and territories, and its managed networks will have 6,000 nodes in 52 countries.
Shares of AT&T (T) ended down 7/8 at 63-3/8 Tuesday on the New York Stock Exchange, while American Depositary Receipts of British Telecommunication (BTY) closed up 2-11/16 at 137-3/16. 
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