WorldCom Says Kansas Bill Would Kill Phone Competition

Passage of SBC-backed Legislation Would Lead to Remonopolization

CLINTON, Miss. -- January 30, 2003 -- Passage of a monopoly-backed deregulation bill (House Bill 2019) could send the Kansas telecommunications market to the days when consumers had no choice other than a plain black telephone, WorldCom warned today.

Testifying before the House Committee on Utilities, Neal Larsen, WorldCom Regional Executive for Public Policy, said: "You have a choice here - of fostering local competition and developing real broadband competition or creating a duopoly of outmoded high-speed Internet connections and remonopolizing the local voice market. Protecting monopolies is not the way to foster innovation or encourage investment."

Larsen urged the committee to reject the anticompetitive legislation because it would allow SBC to corner the market on high-speed DSL Internet services while allowing it to protect its monopoly in the voice market. It would do this by removing the Kansas Corporation Commission's power to protect consumers, handing it over to the distant oversight of the Federal Communications Commission.

"The best analogy I can make is that we are talking about the modern version of the black telephone set days," Larsen said, referring to SBC's high-speed DSL services. "Without real competition . . . Kansas residential customers will be stuck with this decade-old technology."

"Why would you take away your own state's abilities to determine what's right for local competition in Kansas?" Larsen questioned.

When Congress approved the federal Telecommunications Act of 1996, SBC and the other Bell companies agreed to open their local networks to competitors to provide local service in return for the right to again be in the long distance business, Larsen noted. Now that that FCC has permitted long distance entry in most states, however, the Bell companies have been engaged in a multi-front war -- in Congress, at the FCC, at state commissions and in the state legislatures to reverse the commitments and the promises they made to get that long distance authority, Larsen said.

About WorldCom, Inc.
WorldCom, Inc. (WCOEQ, MCWEQ) is a pre-eminent global communications provider for the digital generation, operating in more than 65 countries. With one of the most expansive, wholly-owned IP networks in the world, WorldCom provides innovative data and Internet services for businesses to communicate in today's market. In April 2002, WorldCom launched The Neighborhood built by MCI - the industry's first truly any-distance, all-inclusive local and long-distance offering to consumers for one fixed monthly price. For more information, go to http://www.worldcom.com.