MCI Communications Corp yesterday previewed its vision of future telecommunications in the US with formal announcement of its plans to enter the local telephone service business in competition with the Baby Bells, part of a commitment by the company and its partners to invest over $20,000m to create and deliver an array of new services to teleconsumers, businesses, research facilities and government customers under the name networkMCI. The first element of networkMCI is what the company describes as the first trans-continental US information superhighway using Sonet Synchronous Optical Network fibre optic technology at speeds claimed to be 15 times faster than any existing Sonet network – with the US National Science Foundation Network the first user of its New York to Los Angeles Sonet system. Sonet is to be available throughout MCI’s domestic network by the end of the year, and on international routes across the Atlantic and the Pacific by 1995 – and the company intends to increase carrying speeds on existing fibre from 2.5Gbps per second to more than 10Gbps by 1995. The plans for local phone service revolve around MCI Metro, a new wholly-owned subsidiary that MCI plans will invest $2,000m in fibre rings Metropolitan Area Networks – and loc al switching infra structure in major US metropolitan markets. Construc tion has already begun in Atlanta, with completion expected there by mid-year, it says.
