AT&T’s Homezone interactive system

AT&T is rolling out a new home networking service for its San Diego customers that promises to heat the market war between phone companies and cable firms over bundled services.

AT&T Homezone is an interactive system designed to let the television, home computers, wireless phone and landline work together seamlessly. The telecommunications giant says cable providers just can’t compete with Homezone.

San Diego is getting special attention from AT&T in being one of the first communities to get Homezone technology. That in large part is because we are in one of the nation’s most competitive markets for service packages that bundle traditional landlines with high-speed Internet and television, reports Courtney Byland, an AT&T spokesperson. The technology was introduced in San Antonio and all across Ohio in July. Soon it will roll out across the rest of the country.

Cox Communications spokesperson Ceanne Guerra says Homezone does nothing more than take AT&T’s existing products and services, like Dish TV, and put it all in one box. “We take any competition seriously, but we have been very successful in providing our customers with a lot of high definition television and on-demand programming,” says Guerra.

Guerra says Cox’s movie and sports On-Demand features are instantaneous and unrivaled in the industry. “We’re delivering things that are still not going to be delivered to customers through Homezone,” she says.

Cox is working on remote access to its digital video recording, or DVR, service so that users can remotely schedule program recordings while away from home. The effort is part of a joint venture with Sprint/Nextel and other cable providers. Guerra expects the product will be part of an evolving enhancement of convergence services beginning with voicemail-to-inbox in the first quarter of 2007.

Homezone sees itself with a lead in the convergence game. Homezone users can easily toggle through three screens — TV, computer and wireless — on their living room big screen. They can download movies over broadband, view vacation photos from an online album and play music files stored on their computer.

Time Warner Cable spokesman Marc Farrar says his company isn’t nervous. “I’m not sure we would agree that it would present much of a competitive advantage,” says Farrar. He says Homezone’s features are likely to be very popular with certain customers representing a niche market. AT&T Homezone is available to new AT&T/Dish Network residential customers who either already have or plan to order AT&T Yahoo! High Speed Internet and the 2Wire home networking gateway. The Homezone service is an additional $9.99 a month over the cost of the bundled package.

Telecom news items can be e-mailed to telecom@sandiegometro.com.