Nippon Telegraph and Telephone East Corp. is planning to provide its integrated services digital network subscribers with a line that is more than 10 times faster than ISDN lines by the end of fiscal 2000, company sources said Tuesday.
NTT East will provide the subscribers with a digital subscriber line capable of telecommunications at speeds of between 700 and 1,500 kilobits per second, the sources said.
ISDN services currently enable connection to the Internet at a speed of only 64 kilobits per second.
The DSL service will make use of existing lines, adopting the symmetrical line system to enable large-capacity data transmission necessary for sending and receiving moving images.
NTT East is likely to charge a fixed monthly fee for the service and will not raise the ISDN fee significantly from current levels, the sources said, adding that it will be roughly around 10,000 yen, including the basic charge.
Households will be able to use all three lines for telephone, facsimile and Internet use.
By boosting its ISDN service, NTT East hopes to remain competitive amid the growing number of rivals in the telecommunications industry as well as the cable television industry that provide high-speed Internet access.
NTT West Corp. is also likely to take a similar move in the future, the sources said.