GTE Sues AT&T, Excite@Home On Open Access Issue.

GTE Corp. has filed a lawsuit against AT&T Corp.,as well as its exclusive provider of broadband Internet access services, Excite@Home, saying that AT&T and Excite@Home have set up a business arrangement that denies consumers a choice in who they want as their preferred broadband services provider. GTE also named Comcast as one of the defendants, along with AT&T subsidiary Tele-Communications Inc. GTE said that other Internet service providers should be able to get access to the AT&T-controlled cable pipe, and that if this cannot happen, consumers will be forced to use AT&T_s preferred providers for their cable Internet access, even if they want a competing provider. In a quick response to the charges, Excite@Home issued a compact statement saying that since the Telecommunications Act of 1996 became law, "GTE has spent millions on lawyers in an effort to prevent consumers from reaping the benefits of competition as the law intended." The company also said that GTE also has "lost every significant case." "It would be absurd for the court to find that the antitrust laws should be used to protect an entrenched monopolist, such as GTE, with a greater than 95 percent market share from a new competitor, like Excite@Home, who has less than a 2 percent market share," Excite@Home also said, though it did not describe what it meant by market share. At issue in the lawsuit is the case of open access, or, as AT&T terms it, forced access. AT&T when it bought TCI declined to open up its new cable infrastructure to competing Internet service providers that want to offer broadband services, saying that they are under no obligation to do so. Instead, AT&T forged an exclusive agreement with Excite@Home to provide cable-based broadband Internet access until 2002. Competing ISPs, including some of the baby Bells and incumbent local exchange carriers like GTE and US West Inc., along with companies like America Online Inc.,have argued that it is anti-competitive to keep the networks closed since cable is one of the best ways to receive broadband services. Several courts have disagreed and AT&T currently is appealing a case in Portland, Ore., and surrounding Multnomah County. The FCC, meanwhile, has officially stated that it will not get involved with forcing open access upon AT&T or other cable operators.