With Help From Hindery, GlobalCenter Gears Up

Editor's Note: Please be sure to read today's first installment of Tech Savvy.

Q&A with Jim Seymour Today on TSC message boards. Leo Hindery, the former cable-TV chief at AT&T(T), who was pushed out after repeatedly arguing that the company would be better off if it opened its system to ISPs other than its pet Excite@Home(ATHM), moved recently to Global Crossing(GBLX).

But Hindery's neither much interested nor much involved in Global's traditional business. He's there to get its new GlobalCenter hosting business up to speed quickly, ready for an early-2000 IPO.

Look for GlobalCenter to go head to head with Exodus(EXDS), and Digex(DIGX) and the other big hosting outfits. But also expect Hindery to deliver an application service provider platform, with his own twist. Not as an ASP itself -- I suspect Hindery is wary both of the margins in the ASP business and in the missionary sell involved -- but as a hosting center for other ASP businesses looking for reliability, speed and a little better deal than they can get from the more established firms.

Investor Alert: I think that the GlobalCenter IPO is going to be one of the high-profile IPOs next year, which is saying a lot, given all the flashy offerings queuing up already. If Exodus continues to soar -- and I see no reason for it to stop -- investors will compare the two, decide they like the odds and jump on the GlobalCenter offering with both feet.

Meanwhile, GlobalCenter is likely to crank Global Crossing's share price up substantially, too. (Sound like a stock worth buying soon?)

What's the cash value of one good executive with experience building big businesses (TCI Communications, plus the AT&T cable acquisitions) and respect on Wall Street? Darned high.

>To order reprints of this article, click here: Reprints