If you haven't heard of something called IPTV….you will. Bloomberg Boot Camp, a report on today's technology. SBC Communications…is the second largest local phone company in the U.S….and also has a stake in Cingular…the biggest wireless carrier. And soon it plans to compete with cable TV companies, offering programming over fiber optic cables into the home. Essentially…it will be using the Internet to give customers the next generation of on demand video…or IPTV. SBC calls it Project Lightspeed. Chief Operating Officer Randall Stephenson…says it will become a reality by the end of the year…

"We'll begin building this coverage this year. By the fourth quarter we hope to be in service providing IPTV capability in a number of our markets. We intend to be completed with the build by 2007, passing 18 million homes. The expected cost is going to be about four billion dollars over the three year time frame to get this built."

The super high speed Internet connection will deliver high definition TV programming…as well as faster connections to the Web…and phone services. What will convince consumers to switch from the cable or satellite providers they use now?

"Being able to bring the voice, the entertainment, the broadband and the wireless capabilities into one seamless offering, we think is very important. Plus we believe our content offering will be differentiated. We will have unlimited capacity for content."

That Stephenson says will be much improved from any type of entertainment in the home that exists today. Bloomberg Boot Camp, I'm Fred Fishkin.