U-Verse Continues Rollout of New Markets, Services

AT&T recently announced the rollout of its U-Verse product in new markets in Michigan and Ohio. The company also announced new service features that cable can’t yet match.

In Michigan, U-Verse is now available in parts of 30 communities around the Saginaw, Flint and Midland areas. No mention was made by AT&T as to the parts of the communities where service is actually offered, or even whether service is available in the majority of each of the mentioned communities. If history serves as any guide, though, U-Verse is probably available in just a small portion of each community — probably something around 20% or less of the homes. Finally, there is no mention in the company’s recent announcement of the total number of communities served or homes passed in the State of Michigan. The last such update seems to have occurred early this past summer, when the company asserted that it offered U-Verse in portions of 160 Michigan communities and to about 625,000 “living units” in the state.

A little more detail about the company’s presence in Ohio was offered in AT&T’s announcement about its Toledo rollout. In a story appearing in the Toledo Free Press, AT&T claimed U-Verse was available to 600,000 residences in parts of Ohio communities in and around Akron, Canton, Cleveland, Columbus and Dayton.

Also newly announced by AT&T are two services that cable can’t yet match. The first is a full-house DVR product the company calls Total Home DVR. With the service, any of seven connected TVs in a house can play back standard definition or high definition programming that has been been recorded on the DVR. The service reportedly permits four different programs to be streamed off the DVR to different TVs at once — and three of those streams can be HD feeds. This service seems capable of softening U-Verse’s current competitive disadvantage against cable when it comes to the number of HD channels a home can view off the video system — with cable, a household can view several HD channels at once on different TVs, but with U-Verse, only one HD channel can be viewed in real time (the company has plans to rollout the capability of simultaneously viewing 2 HD channels throughout the forth quarter of this year). For more information about AT&T’s Total Home DVR product, click the story about the San Antonio rollout of the product.

Also new to U-Verse’s product list: Interactive weather. The service is offered in partnership with AccurWeather.com, and allows a customer to enter a zip code for a customized forecast. According to Telecommunications Industry News, the service is available in Atlanta, Austin, Dallas-Fort Worth, Indy, and San Diego, and will be available to other markets in coming months.

AT&T has previously announced an anticipated slowdown in capital spending for the fourth quarter of this year, and a year-end homes passed target of eighteen million for U-Verse.