Comment Re:US vs. Euro vs. Global Telecoms Problems (Score 1) 201
"Worldcom, L3, Global Crossing, and anybody else who built out big fiber networks got caught because the technology for multiplexing lots of very fast connections on a fiber finally caught up with the market."
I think that carrier's problem is that they ovelooked the local loop; although there's a lot of unused bandwith on the copper to the homes I don't hear anybody complaining about the bandwidth glut on copper; I also don't hear any baby bell going bankrupt (ok, some people talk about Qwest; but Qwest in my opinion is one of the smartest baby bells in handling the local loop; it hasn't anything to do with you thinking that their service sucks). Why isn't anybody complaining? Because you have a paying customer on that line. However, carrier's customer is beyond that local loop.
The fact is that you need a customer in order to have revenue; local loop is in my opinion a natural monopoly so if the customer is yours the only thing stopping you from building a network and providing the service is business stupidity (ex: @Home providing internet access on cable companies' networks). This kind of stupidity is not going to last forever; solutions to this? Level3 went into software; AOL bought TW (well, they got more than they bargained for).
People say that the telecom doom is due to dot com doom; and why is that? In my opinion the problem is that those dot coms were like piramydal schemes: at some point the number of new customers didn't grew at the same pace due to local loop providers seeing their own stupidity: why should they put money in someone else's pocket? Why shouldn't they have their own network? Unfortunately, network building takes time and money and at this moment nobody wants to tell investors that they are putting fiber into the ground. However, in the telecom doom there will be plenty of cheap networks...
At this moment, in my opinion the best positioned in the industry are Cable&Wireless and Qwest; unless something goes terribly wrong (accounting issues etc.) all the others players should get in similar situation or go down. Bundling rules! (not that I like it)
Of course, there's also wireless; but this technology has a few things to sort out before it will be ready for massive deployment (first of all there's still quite some research still going on).
I think that carrier's problem is that they ovelooked the local loop; although there's a lot of unused bandwith on the copper to the homes I don't hear anybody complaining about the bandwidth glut on copper; I also don't hear any baby bell going bankrupt (ok, some people talk about Qwest; but Qwest in my opinion is one of the smartest baby bells in handling the local loop; it hasn't anything to do with you thinking that their service sucks). Why isn't anybody complaining? Because you have a paying customer on that line. However, carrier's customer is beyond that local loop.
The fact is that you need a customer in order to have revenue; local loop is in my opinion a natural monopoly so if the customer is yours the only thing stopping you from building a network and providing the service is business stupidity (ex: @Home providing internet access on cable companies' networks). This kind of stupidity is not going to last forever; solutions to this? Level3 went into software; AOL bought TW (well, they got more than they bargained for).
People say that the telecom doom is due to dot com doom; and why is that? In my opinion the problem is that those dot coms were like piramydal schemes: at some point the number of new customers didn't grew at the same pace due to local loop providers seeing their own stupidity: why should they put money in someone else's pocket? Why shouldn't they have their own network? Unfortunately, network building takes time and money and at this moment nobody wants to tell investors that they are putting fiber into the ground. However, in the telecom doom there will be plenty of cheap networks...
At this moment, in my opinion the best positioned in the industry are Cable&Wireless and Qwest; unless something goes terribly wrong (accounting issues etc.) all the others players should get in similar situation or go down. Bundling rules! (not that I like it)
Of course, there's also wireless; but this technology has a few things to sort out before it will be ready for massive deployment (first of all there's still quite some research still going on).
