NEW DELHI: Covad Communications Group, Inc and CenturyTel, Inc. are among the
international investors who have invested a total of US $70 million in
DishnetDSL Limited, one of India's leading national broadband provider of
Internet access using digital subscriber line (DSL) technology. Covad
Communications is the leading US national broadband service provider of
high-speed Internet and network access utilizing DSL technology. CenturyTel,
Inc., Louisiana, US, is the provider of integrated communications services
including local exchange, wireless, long distance, Internet access and security
monitoring services to more than two million customers in 20 states.
In addition to Covad and CenturyTel, the list of investors include HSBC
Private Equity Funds, Citicorp International Finance Corporation and IQ
Investments Ltd. DishnetDSL Limited also announced that it has entered into an
agreement with Covad to license Covad's proprietary operational support system
for Dishnet's use in India. This highly automated operational support system
based on web interfaces has been developed and is used by Covad in the US. The
system eliminates many manual processes such as line testing, network path
configuration, equipment configuration, order taking and verification, billing
and telephone wire supplier management. This should enable DishnetDSL to scale
its business rapidly as well as facilitate the national roll-out of DishnetDSL's
DSL services in India.