Houlihan Lokey’s Media & Telecom Group
October 24, 2009
I was an invited speaker to the recent Houlihan Lokey’s Media & Telecom Group Conference at the Waldorf Astoria in New York City.
For the most part, with the exception of two of my charts, I behaved myself. But, that’s not the real story coming out of this conference.
Houlihan Lokey did something very different from most banking firms that host these events for the financial community. They invited a number of privately-owned Telecom and media companies to present their businesses, strategies and outlook. Similar banking events often only invite publicly traded companies, which basically tell you what you already know by reading their quarterly reports and filings under Sarbanes-Oxley. The “big guys” mentality
exist at those events even though, in the grand scheme of things, some of the “big guys” are still a pimple in comparison to an ILEC .
I think the eye opener at this conference was for the Private Equity firms attending. They were able to receive information on companies that, quite frankly, outperform a number of public companies by significant margins and benchmarks. Albeit smaller companies, but the fact of the matter is, give these same small firms the capital to expand, and they will take many public firms to the cleaners. Most PE firms, however, wrestle with believing, “I can only invest hundreds of millions of dollars.” in my opinion, investments should always made on the management team. It’s like the old saying at the race track – always bet on the jockey. You can always add money, so why let someone get drunk on up-front cash regardless of business model or razzle-dazzle PowerPoint charts and projections?
Too often CEO’s with too much cash go on ego trips with that cash burning a vicious hole in their pocket. Becoming a celebrity CEO and using someone else’s money is disingenuous at a minimum! Our last round of Celebrity CEO’s and
CFO’s using other peoples money resulted in the telecom meltdown circa 2001-2003 … let’s not have short memories. Fund responsible management – not a story of conquering lust!
Many presenters leading the private companies have in fact previously held executive positions at multi-billion dollar firms, I amongst them. One reason I started AFS was the waste of capital and human resources at large companies I often witnessed that could perform much better if utilized appropriately or should have less people as they underutilize their intellectual capabilities either by operating procedure limitations or cultures of control. The human resource maximization mindset was well illustrated by the low churn rates of customers the private firms disclosed. Focus on customers is paramount over focus on each other internally was a key repeating theme.
A lunch time panel of various financial firms indicated that things are changing and they see consolidation relative to metro fiber firms picking up as the bid and ask gaps have closed, however, the bid and ask gaps have increased amongst media companies for various risks more related to the evolution of the Internet and uncertainty than anything else. The favor of metro fiber is the real accelerating growth of organic bandwidth, the need of optic connectivity to enable everything else and the “platform” fiber provides growth and flexibility by owning such a platform.
From a metro fiber platform, you can remain a horizontal provider of services or vertically integrate services — when the markets make sense to do so. A local fiber platform gives an operator this advantage over the risk of an application provider which is asset-light.
I would be remiss by not saying that I did get to see and say hello to many of my PE friends that have been looking to get into the metro fiber space “platform” for at least the past four years. Once again, I believe the performance by the private firm’s disclosed at this conference must make for some interesting PE introspective relative to existing portfolio companies, quality of management and execution focus.
In addition, at the conference, the recent announcement of Comcast purchasing a Chicago CLEC has caught the attention of many. The scuttlebutt at the conference was the multiple of EBITDA was well north of 10x and to expect more cable companies looking at the “small metro Telecom guys” who are fast, focused and thrifty as future consolidation occurs.
Why cable companies?
As rumor had it at the show, Comcast not only bought the CLEC “business” to go deeper into metro and establish a solid beachhead for business customers but to obtain people that know how to compete in local telecom … kudos to Comcast for thinking diversely, differently, realistically and non-insular.
I suggest, if given the opportunity and if Houlihan Lokey repeats the private company invites at their next Telecom & Media Conference, it could be well worth your while and eye-opening to attend.
I was hesitant to participate when invited, I am glad I did.
Tele-Orgasm
September 24, 2009
I have a new word and sensation for Telecom – it’s the Tele-orgasm.
A Tele-orgasm is the tingling sensation that Chris Matthews gets when he encounters a fiber bigot, such as myself, discussing copper loop removal from a building or residence. Yes, the Tele-orgasm is the equivalent of Chris Matthews in awe of anything President Obama utters – that same identical tingling.
At the Goldman Sachs investor conference this week, Ivan “The Terrible FIOS” Seidenberg, CEO of Verizon pretty much stated that copper is just about dead as far as Verizon is concerned. These comments were aimed at the shrinking loss of lines that analysts like to measure. Joined by Randall “FTTP” Stephenson, CEO of AT&T and Ed “Wireless-less” Mueller, CEO of Qwest, all concurred that someday the landline loss would stop shrinking.
As aptly reported by conference attendee Saul Hansell of the New York Times, “In other words, that snipping sound you hear around copper phone lines is just going to get louder.”
Oh, that tingling sensation I get just thinking about it!
In the same article, Seidenberg declared, “Video is going to be the core product in the fixed-line business and the focus will move from selling bundles of video and landline to video and cell phones.” He added: “Once I shed myself of the burden of chasing the inflection point in access lines and say ‘I don’t care about that anymore,’ I am actually liberated.” Let’s here it for liberty and freedom – I am having a vision, perhaps Ivan can be caste in a remake of “Braveheart” as William Wallace – the Telecom version!
Since I have written about this before, let me translate this for Wall Street: Measuring legacy copper lines is of declining value, possibly of no value at all. It is not an indicator of anything anymore. Ivan, Randy and Ed won’t say it, but I have before and will again — you need to measure ports installed and bandwidth deployed. Mr. Wall Street – any idea how many simultaneous VOIP calls you can run over one port of Gigabit Ethernet? You count that “port” today as a line… Think about it. You really don’t know how much net line loss is going on with VOIP as a substitute for copper TDM lines, do you?
And I do know for a fact that many of you on Wall Street do read this blog but never comment. That’s called voyeurism.
The other secret I’ll let out of the bag, though my buddy Ivan insinuated it, is this: They are not the telephone company anymore. Wall Street-–you need to accept this and figure out what to measure accordingly. The big “service push” that is evolving is data. And I don’t mean data in the sense of point A to point B.
What I am talking about is the effort by my three new friends trying to figure out how to sell one data plan to customers that covers all their needs — fixed and mobile. People don’t want to pay for separate, multiple data plans – a single “portable” data plan is of significant value to the customer. Data – anytime, anyplace, on-demand regardless of access device is powerful. The single point IP addressable data plan is the new Holy Grail in telecom. A personal data plan or a shared corporate data plan —- but one data plan period – wire line (fiber) or wireless (LTE/4G/Wimax) is coming our way. So stop it with the copper line loss shenanigans.
However, before we get to data utopia, that copper needs to get snipped … and there goes that tingling sensation – another Tele-orgasm.
Digital Britain
September 2, 2009
In my former life, I used to travel the globe mercilessly on business. You name the place–I pretty much have been there. One might say I am a mystery man of international intrigue.
One of my haunting places on many, many occasions was the United Kingdom. So, I keep a watchful eye on the comings and goings within UK telecoms and Europe in general, plus South America, plus Asia, plus Australia/New Zealand . I affectionately refer to the UK, when it comes to things like healthcare, horticulture, cuisine and telecoms, as the land of “That’s Good Enough.”
I just came across a report called Digital Britain published under Lord Stephen Carter, the first Minister for Communications, Technology and Broadcasting. Just Google or BING “Digital Britain” and “Lord Carter” and you to can download this 245 page report as well. (I put BING in here just in case Google reads this…).
There were two things that caught my eye, though I have not read the report cover to cover, that I would like to share with my loyal fiber bigot readers…and of course the few copper loop loving Oafs. Don’t worry–I love my loyalists and copper Oafs equally. It’s all about the love at American Fiber Systems.
In the land of “That’s Good Enough” it’s nice to see not much has changed. Though Telecom is a £52 billion a year economic driver, the British government has in its sights a goal. That goal is this: by 2012, for all of Britain have broadband speeds of 2 megabits. This is classical British authority – the government establishing what’s good enough for the British commoners.
In fairness, they do recognize the value of fiber optics to the home and businesses per the Digital Britain report.
So, beyond 2012, they want fiber and they want it everywhere. Per the report, they pretty much figured out that 2/3 of the country can be served by just letting private Enterprise compete in an open market with limited government involvement but regulatory oversight of British Telecom by Ofcom (aka their FCC) to succeed with last mile fiber deployment.
Lord Carter, through Digital Britain, has concluded that there needs to be the ambition “to accelerate the rate of growth, and cement the UK’s position as a world leader in the knowledge and learning economy.” Note to Lord Carter and the Queen of England: You are not going to cement anything at 2 megabits per second – I can swim the English Channel faster – I told you I am a mystery man of International intrigue.
So our friend the Lord, has proposed an idea to address the remaining 1/3 of the country that can’t be addressed by the private sector due to rural economics. He has proposed a tax of 50 pence per month or £6 per year on each and every copper loop as long as they are in existence.
The collected tax will be centrally collected, controlled and disbursed by Ofcom to subsidize the private sector to service and build out rural UK with fiber optics. Lord Carter believes this scheme will in 4-5 years time provide fiber access across 90 percent of the UK. Estimated tax proceeds from the copper facilities of £175 million per year will be the source of public funds to achieve rural fiber access by matching it with private funds. I am sure eventually that reality will settle in and that wireless 4G, LTE or WiMax will also play a subsidized role in the hinterland. I have been to Scotland – I don’t see running fiber cables from glen to glen.
What I like about this approach, is the British government trying to stay out of the mix as much as possible (translated – no government authority or entity trying to be in the communications business.) Maybe by watching America, they wish not to repeat our mistakes of municipal or public utility participation on a tax subsidized basis, not being required to make a profit, let alone have the appropriate core competencies or burning desire of an entrepreneur.
Now, for a few of my readers that may be from the UK, or conduct business there or just follow things like this as I do, you may be thinking: “But Dave, isn’t the push on for Fiber-to-the-Curb (FTTC) in the United Kingdom leaving the access to copper?” And my answer to that is yes!
That’s the beauty of the tax.
Today, British Telecom is the national wholesale backbone provider and for this privilege is regulated by Ofcom. BT is required to place at various intervals along the backbone cross-connect huts with power and get this – non-discriminatory, equal access to the copper from the hut to the residence or building. If a hut runs out of space, BT is required to build another hut adjacent. Most of these “huts” are underground. No volume discounts or any of those last mile “special access” games – competitors pay the same for the last mile copper as BT uses it for itself. (I am trying to keep things simple). BT is the wholesaler – the technology push is last mile for all.
The incentive over time is for competitors and BT to build fiber from the hut to the premise to displace the copper and the tax that goes along with it. Nothing prohibits a competitor to build their own backbone in and around the huts. This makes for an interesting mix of diverse last mile options that could range from a neighborhood to multiple kilometer area coverage. The key is the equal access, non-discriminatory and same cost interconnection in the huts. To a certain extent, it can rationalize the deployment of capital expense whereby a last mile fiber owner has a sharing incentive for access (i.e. waves) or take the risk of getting built over for trying to be a last mile monopolist. If a competitor has an equal access backbone from BT, it becomes a more level playing field for rational access deployments.
There is a very nice Layer 2 access model in all of this as an option for private investment.
BT as a wholesaler will get regulatory relief as networks and options evolve, but as things evolve they have every incentive to deliver reliable, diverse and equitable bandwidth to those huts. If they don’t, besides Ofcom, competition with open access to the huts can usurp their wholesale position.
It will be interesting to see if the tax gets approved. I am not one for taxes; however, copper loops are like kryptonite to me, it makes a nation weak.
BTOP Nuggets
July 21, 2009
My dear friends and fellow taxpayers,
You won’t believe what I am about to tell you. Make sure you are sitting down. It’s about the Beltway again.
Remember all that stimulus money (aka tax dollars/future debt) President Obama is sprinkling across America? Well, $7.2 billion of it is dedicated to the Broadband Technology Opportunity Program (BTOP) with a primary emphasis on making low interest loans and grants available for broadband infrastructure.
Two Federal organizations have processes to distribute the funds. The traditional Department of Agriculture RUS administration serving rural communities (loans) and under the Department of Commerce the NTIA is serving in a matching grant capacity issuance of funds.
Here comes the UNBELIEVABLE part – two nuggets just for you.
The first nugget, the NTIA is responsible for awarding $4.2 billion in funds. That’s “b” as in billion. The NTIA is seeking unpaid but “expert” volunteers to assess grant applications and score them. Just think about this for one second.
If I were a nasty ass ILEC or Cable Company, I would have every “expert” on my payroll apply to volunteer. I would ask every retiree with a pension interest to volunteer. I would have every law firm or consulting firm I have ever done business with encourage to have their experts apply to volunteer. If I were the CWA, I would get expert members or retirees with pension interests to apply as volunteers.
Talk about conflicts of interest…who you may know over what your application says; potential of fraud, competitive bias, potential of grant fixing, the overall integrity of the process and lack of plain old commonsense. This is amazing!!!!
There are no other “volunteers” in any other area of the $700+ billion stimulus funds being distributed. This is ripe for corruption, schemes, collusion – you name it.
The second nugget, after any entity submits a proposal, the proposal will be posted for public review/comment. This is called “transparency”. Within the process of a public review, there is an ability to question a proposal on its merits by a third party. A proposal may be declined based upon what this third party states or alleges. By the way, if you submit a proposal and are challenged by a third party; you have no due process rights if this happens. The NTIA will not even disclose to you who questioned what or what they alleged. If this isn’t Communism, what is it?
If I were a nasty ass ILEC or Cable Company–any municipality proposing anything–I would be submitting a challenge. If I were a nasty ass ILEC, Cable Company, Wireless Carrier, ISP or CLEC (and for pure self-serving competitive reasons) and saw a proposal that gives me competitive heartburn, I would be submitting a challenge. One would think any and all “challenges” would be transparent and open for public scrutiny as well.
I thought we recently elected transparency.
Pretty nuts, huh!!
Jacko
July 2, 2009
Dateline: June 25, 2009.
Headline: Michael Jackson is Dead
Dateline: June 25, 2009
Headline: The Web Collapses Under The Weight Of Michael Jackson’s Death
Wake up America … if something really big happens (Think Crazy Man with nukes in North Korea), you can’t count on the web.
The government infrastructure programs and future Policy need to require minimum bandwidth delivery of 100 megabits – the proof is in the pudding. I think it should not only be a global economic imperative for the US of A competitiveness for REAL broadband over fiber but also in the interests of Public Safety and National Security.
Fiber access … plain and simple.
Something big happens (Think Crazy man with nukes in Iran), only the rural folks will have connectivity as major centers crash.
Life is Funny…
June 25, 2009
Just a passing thought on CEO’s and CFO’s in the telecom business since the Communications Act of 1996 with Wall Street and Investment Bankers as a constant backdrop.
If you owned a restaurant, and the Chef burned it down once, would you hire that Chef again?
How about if the Chef burned your restaurant down twice?
I still wrestle with how CEO’s and/or CFO’s that have burned down multiple companies or the same company multiple times somehow keep showing up and getting yet another shot in the kitchen. Doesn’t anyone do a background check? Does anyone check to see if they went to Culinary School?
How about the financial people that continually back the Chef? Maybe a little investment in a fire suppression system would be in order first.
I know…everyone in America is a victim. The Chef can’t be responsible.
Then there are the Chefs that run great restaurants and don’t burn them down. But, they are too small of Cheftom to possibly handle a “too big to fail” restaurant.
And then there are the financial investor Chefs in the kitchen with the Chef “helping out” …
Life is funny.
The Cat and the Rat
June 18, 2009
Though I try to steer away from politics in general (not that I don’t have a thought or two), when former AT&T Chairman & CEO monopolist Ed Whitacre’s name pops up as the next Chairman of GM, I have to say something.
This whole car thing…Ed’s appointment, including the Car Czar Rattner, is getting more and more bizarre.
Let’s start with America first, a habit I have of doing. We have an unenjoyment (unemployment) rate over 9%. Amongst the 9% of people not working in America, who want to work, we can’t find anyone else for these positions except Whitacre and Rattner.
Ed Whitacre was not nominated by the GM Management Committee. Ed Whitacre is not being voted upon by the shareholders. Ed Whitacre was appointed Chairman post-BK (chosen) by the Treasury Department! The same Treasury Department headed up by a guy named Geitner, an ex-Goldman Sachs hash slinger. The same Geitner socializing, I mean nationalizing, our banks to “save” them. Think TARP with strings attached and changing the rules, stress tests and other gimmicks.
President Obama just appointed his 16th Czar who is accountable to no one. This is the Salary Czar.
Wouldn’t you think that a Salary Czar might be against hiring Whitacre on? After all, Mr. Whitacre is living off of a $158 million AT&T pension … just like most other AT&T retirees.
Sure I know, he and other government-picked–I mean, independent–Board Directors will work for a dollar a year until things get better at GM. However, Ed Whitacre openly admits he knows nothing about the auto industry and has no experience manufacturing anything. So, at a dollar a year, I guess you get what you pay for. Even unenjoyment pays more than a dollar a year.
(Please don’t tell me how a Chairman is focused on strategy because you would be wrong — a Chairman’s primary duty, I think it is called a Fiduciary Duty, is to make sure all shareholder interests are represented at the table … emphasis on the word “all.” Many companies have separated the Chairman’s role from the CEO’s role for this exact reason – CEO focuses on strategy and execution; Chairman focuses on shareholder interests.)
Are we sure there is no other choice in the 9% unemployed that could use this job? A $158 million pension package … how does Ed get by? Really sorry to see a guy leave retirement to make ends meet. But social security being the mess it is in, can you blame him?
Now the Car Czar, Steve Rattner. Stevie has a reported net worth of at least $188 million, some say over $600 million. He is also building a small $18 million cottage on Martha’s Vineyard. Like our buddy Ed, I just don’t know how he makes ends meet.
In his role as Car Czar he is not accountable to anyone in terms of our Constitution–not even Ed. But if recent history is any indication of the future – if Ed and the Car Czar disagree — bye-bye Eddie!
Our Car Czar does have some history in the auto industry. In the recent past he invested into Cerberus Holdings. Yes– the Cerberus Holdings that took Chrysler private. Yes–the Chrysler with TARP money, who is now owned by Fiat; and well, let’s say Cerberus did not do quite well in the deal. Steven also owns $1000.00 in Ford Motor Company stock in a family trust. Seems qualified to me.
But Rattner’s specialty is really deal making and knowing how to invest in really good things! Yet another Real Smart Guy from Wall Street at the helm! I am not quite sure but Stevie may have been involved in some of those credit default swap things that are way too sophisticated for people like you and I to understand. I wonder how Stevie made out with his packaged paper?
Ed and Stevie probably crossed paths years ago. As Ed was putting Humpty-Dumpty (Ma Bell, aka: the ILECs) back together again by acquisitions which the government turned a blind-eye upon, I am fairly confident an investment banking firm that Mr. Rattner was with may have been involved in a few of those transactions … for a fee of course and independent judgment.
My point: we should all feel good that Ed and Stevie share common history – the formation of a team nucleus for the new GM.
What about GM in all this? Let’s see… Senior secured bondholders were trashed (forget about contracts and that pesky Constitution). Junior, unsecured debt became senior when converted into shares. We have a monopolist as Chairman while the government under its Car Czar owns 62% of the new GM.
I really don’t see a happy ending to this story. Do you?
Back to the Future
May 15, 2009
It’s Back to the Future for me – just like the movie.
The big media buzz of Verizon selling select rural wire line (copper) facilities to Frontier Communications over 14 states for $5.6 billion in Frontier stock is the latest indicator that a consolidation cycle is starting and credit markets thawing. Though this deal won’t see Free Cash Flow positive for Frontier Communications for two years, it is the right strategic move for both companies. For an RLEC transaction, the EBITDA multiple is very good.
Verizon is focusing on the higher growth population centers and gains from the divestment of rural facilities that no longer accommodate Verizon. This also lessens any argument that Verizon is a menacing monopoly by way of this divestment.
Frontier Communications benefits from scale as they specialize in more rural areas to the extent they gain more proficiencies by integration. Frontier Communications does not serve the most rural of rural locations, so don’t expect any effort to deliver broadband to the barn, Green Acres or Petticoat Junction. It’s a great consolidating play for Frontier Communications, especially using stock as a currency, leaving the ability to lever debt off of EBITDA flows as a viable option/hedge.
Why is it back to the future for me? Well, way back in the early 1990’s, I was the first President of Frontier Communications well before the Communications Act of 1996. Once again, I will find myself holding Frontier stock as a result of this transaction since I hold Verizon stock. I am more confident this time that my stock quality will sustain itself, as the last time I held Frontier stock, the bandits from Global Crossing bought Frontier Communications, and in very short order destroyed shareowner value, the wealth and pensions of thousands of people. And no one went to prison.
I would like to share with you, my gracious readers, a funny story as an aside to this transaction (at least for me). If you go back to the 1990’s, the really big thing back then was long distance carriers. Hundreds, if not thousands of them existed. In the mid-1990’s, a consolidating cycle amongst these carriers had commenced as there was an over supply of carriers (capacity) that drove long distance prices so low, that you either merged for cost synergy or went bankrupt.
During this time of long distance consolidation, I participated in the Frontier Corporation M&A meetings discussing various targets or strategies. My invite was eventually lost in the mail.
If you have read the blog for sometime now, you know I don’t buy into the lemming model of business (move as a group to mitigate risk in the eyes of Wall Street…after all, if everyone is doing the same thing, it must be the right/safe thing to be doing. And, Wall Street, of course, being the fee-based vultures they are, happily endorses such paradigms.) Myself, I prefer contrarian moves and innovation.
Back to the M&A meetings: My first meeting, I went and listened. After all I was the new guy from “outside” the phone company and I wanted to take in the ambience. The second meeting, I raised my hand and made a suggestion. That suggestion was not to focus on buying into the over-supply of long haul carriers which drove prices into the ground, but instead to focus on acquiring local operating companies that already own infrastructure who are a gateway to the multitudes of long distance operators. My simple mind theory on this approach was that once prices go down, they usually don’t go up – integration synergies will keep the price wars going as things consolidate. I was told: “Dave that’s an interesting idea.” And the discussion continued on acquiring long haul carrier interests.
The third meeting I attended, I listened attentively again. Once again, I suggested a contrarian focus on acquiring local operators, this time my logic was that it had been my experience that those whom are closest to the customer have a better relationship and competitive advantage over those that are more distant – like in long distance. I was told: “Dave–that’s an interesting idea.” And the discussion continued on acquiring long haul carrier interests.
The fourth meeting…well there was no fourth meeting for me. Somehow my name fell off the e-mail invitation list. Several months later, Frontier merged (acquired) a major long distance carrier.
Today, as we know, long distance is near free with services such a Vonage, VOIP, Skype and MagicJack rapidly driving all-you-can-eat long distance services at flat rates across the globe. Flat rate all-distance is not far behind.
Since waking up with Back to the Future, my biggest worry now is waking up in Ground Hog Day – just like the movie. There is nothing brewing, but the Ground Hog irony of this adventure would be if Frontier Communications were ever to acquire American Fiber Systems because of our local presence, unique fiber assets, lucrative ARPU’s and our focus on being closest to the customer!
Talk about crazy!
A Week of Responses 4
April 24, 2009
The last in this week’s installment of response to readers–
Response to “Why I’m Bullish on Qwest”:
Dave,
Verizon was not forced to sell any of its rural properties – Hawaii, KY, or New England. It did it purely to get out of rural was the story. To get out from under the responsibility that Qwest, Windstream and Embarq have: how do I leverage my current aged copper plant in rural land to forestall declining revenue? In other words, I can’t or won’t roll out FTTx because there isn’t enough return.
–Reader
Dear Loyal Reader,
Verizon was smart, they purposely exited remote business areas in relative comparison to their footprint. They got out from underneath a lot of high maintenance network, limited copper infrastructure and a high cost per mile to serve. Verizon is smart. If you go back to the mid-1990’s, cable companies did something similar by swapping properties with each other to consolidate a footprint. Cable companies are not dumb either. As the saying goes inside the
beltway — never waste a good crisis — the monopolist, never waste a good opportunity to concentrate.
–Dave
Dave,
What does Qwest (or US West) do without a national fiber network? It loses all that IP and LD revenue as well as its long-haul wave revenue and probably its CyberCentre money.
–Reader
Dear Loyal Reader,
I don’t run Qwest, but I would sell off a few rural states (like Verizon did) — pare down some more debt. I would consolidate local fiber assets in more lucrative markets and become a consolidator and wholesale provider of local connectivity and IP. The business model is simpler and needed.
–Dave
Dave,
$2-3B against a debt of $14B. It would be better off spinning off the LH business like Alltel or Sprint did. IPO it and pay off that debt. Even in this market it would probably work.
–Peter
Peter,
There is no IPO market. Long haul was sexy in the 1990’s, that is long over.
–Dave
A Week of Responses 3
April 23, 2009
A third installment of responses to readers’ comments–
In response to “Fresh Squeezed in Florida”:
Dave,
It is interesting you bring up the differential treatment between Cable MSO and Telecom. We are working with the same issue regarding property taxation in relation to the Communications Industry. Telecommunication companies in most states are taxed Centrally at the State level and Cable MSO’s are taxed at the local level. Rather than create a 21st Century tax scheme for a 21st Century technology, some states are trying to pull the Cableco’s into Central Assessment. I don’t believe that is the answer.
–Brian
Dear Brian,
In relation to this, there are different cost rates for pole attachments if you are a utility, cable company, ILEC or CLEC … one would think a cable is a cable … how does the pole know any different …
–Dave
Response to “Skype Makes an Interesting Move”:
Dave,
I am very excited that this codec was released. However, I am really wondering how long until hardware devices start taking advantage of this? Will we start seeing a flood of firmware updates with SILK support?
–TJ
TJ,
To be honest, I have been around the software business a long time, it makes me think about bad things, really bad things. I don’t miss the software business.
–Dave
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