AT&T’s two-pronged approach to broadband should get a boost next month with the launch of Homezone, a service that will allow users to download movies from Movielink for TV viewing and to watch Echostar’s Dish Network programming. The Journal reports that the launch will start in a few markets with service in 80 percent of AT&T’s territory by the end of the year.
Homezone allows AT&T to offer a TV/broadband package more quickly than it will be able to via the more complicated IPTV-based Project Lightspeed—and to better compete with cable operators already including voice services in their bundles. Sanford Bernstein analyst Craig Moffett puts it in perspective for the WSJ: “It will be nice to have the product for AT&T ... but it’s hard to cast Homezone as a game changer.”
Related: AT&T’s HomeZone Digital Home Service To Integrate Akimbo; For Dish & Yahoo Customers