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Peter
| Peter Radizeski of RAD-INFO, Inc. talking telecom, Cloud, VoIP, CLEC, and The Channel.

May 2012

You are browsing the archive for May 2012.

JAB May Buy Keyon

May 31, 2012

"Its a typical situation in these typical times..." Dave Matthews Band

It seems that ISP roll-ups just don't last long. Volaris anyone? This story has a Tampa flavor, since KeyOn Communications Holdings Inc., acquired Broadsoft's second customer ever, CommX, in June of 2011 (last year).

Tidbits About the GC-L3 Combo

May 29, 2012

I sat through a 65 slide presentation from Level3 about the integration of Global Crossing. The stats are nice for trivia night. Maybe someday CVX will hold a Telecom Jeopardy so I can use this trivia to win prizes.

  • Level3 holds the original VoIP patent.

So Many Conferencing Options

May 29, 2012

Just Google web conferencing to see 18 million results. This list of web conferencing is extensive but far from complete. Conferencing is starting to look like the VoIP space -- a bunch of people jumping in to get a piece of the action. Join.me, StartMeeting.com, Freeconference.com, Yuuguu.com, G+ Hangout, skype and so many more in the no cost variety.

Fiber and Data Centers

May 28, 2012

For fiber today, it is all about 3 things: exclusive route, low-latency and data center access.

We see a number of fiber operators talking about low latency routes now, something that AboveNet was already capitalizing on - that and its unique (non CO-based) network design.

"Zayo Group announces it is enhancing its low latency service between Seattle and Chicago." In addition, Zayo added 60 miles in Richmond that will connect to a data center campus. Data centers need fiber.

No Traction in Hosted PBX Market

May 25, 2012

According to Insight Research, independent hosted PBX providers should be able to take some small business market share from the Duopoly over the next five years.

The small business market size is more than 40 millions lines, says Robert Rosenberg, INSIGHT Research president. That will mean even more hosted PBX seats since lines and seats are not 1 for 1. "Our study suggests that thus far, small businesses haven't quite latched on to this new technology so the revenue today is only in the range of one-half billion dollars, but by 2015 hosted services will be nearly a $1.2 billion market and the adoption rate of the hosted services by small businesses will accelerate," Rosenberg concluded.

Will It Rain for EarthLink in the Cloud?

May 24, 2012

EarthLink is really pulling out the umbrella to get it to rain in Cloud. EarthLink picked up XO's former CMO, Michael Toplisek, as EVP of IT Services. The press release says that he was President of Concentric Cloud, but that was for a hot minute, since XO only rolled out that brand 2 weeks ago. He's not a cloud guy - he worked at XO, Global Crossing, MCI and Frontier - all telcos.

A Lesson in Value Proposition

May 23, 2012

This came across my twitter stream this week:

"Must-read for founders: A VC explains how to build a killer value proposition" on VentureBeat by Michael Skok, a Venture Capitalist at North Bridge Venture Partners. His slideshare page contains a couple of really good decks of information about Go-To-Market and Value Prop - two things that I help companies address in this industry.

That's his Go-to-Market diagram.

Combatting Mobile Data

May 23, 2012

How do you offer your broadband customers mobile access? There are a couple of options. One is MVNO, reselling cellular data cards to your customers. This is a very expensive option.

No Special Sauce

May 21, 2012

Cellular Mayhem

May 18, 2012

Just looking at the news makes me think that the cellular industry is having a week of mayhem. Besides the mess I wrote about earlier this week, "US wholesale player LightSquared has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection amid efforts to resolve regulatory issues that have prevented it from launching its satellite service," according to Telecoms. "The carrier has been planning to build a ground-based LTE network, supported by satellites, but the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) blocked the project, stating that the proposed mobile broadband network will impact GPS services and that there is no practical way to mitigate the potential interference." That about spells it all out.

A Day in My Brain

May 18, 2012

I was in NYC (Tribeca) this week to spend the day at a Q&A session with Seth Godin. He is a marketing guru and author of a lot of best selling business books. Like these:

Here are some of the gems that I liked.

"A "brand" is the promise of an experience." [Boy, could I riff on that one!] Brand IS the experience.

A Game of Risk

May 17, 2012

Everyone blames the FCC. AT&T blames the FCC for all of its woes after the FCC (and the DOJ) said no to its merger with T-Mobile. Boo-hoo. It was a risk.

Sprint is Losing

May 17, 2012

I have had Sprint for a long time. Mainly, I have them because I don't like to give my money to the RBOC cellcos. I may just have to switch.

Sprint's network makes me think that THEY are an MVNO.

Polycom Gets Some Cash

May 11, 2012

Robo-Calls

May 11, 2012

I need to learn not to answer the phone if I don't know the caller. It's always robo-calls. And it is usually a Level3 number! 407-412-9892 was the Florida PAL.

The Incumbent Mindset

May 10, 2012

I'm heading to NYC next week to attend Seth Godin's seminar. It is always worth the trip to me. From his Domino Project newsletter today, a little insight:

"It happens to just about every industry, from hard drives to furniture--the insurgents, coming up from the bottom of the market, had an incentive to refine their techniques, engage with their customers and innovate. The incumbents, saddled with much higher costs and less innovation, watched themselves go bankrupt, one by one."

Can you say China?

A Frank Look at the iPhone

May 7, 2012

From the NYTimes, "Randall Stephenson, AT&T's chief executive, shared some surprisingly frank comments about the iPhone." Stephenson regrets unlimited data pricing. Since moving to tiered data prices, the company has made more money. DUH!! He cries about "...it's a variable cost model.

Duopoly Now Offering Home Automation and Security

May 7, 2012

Comcast, Bright House Networks, Cox, TWC, Verizon and now AT&T are offering home automation and security service. BHN and VZ are competing in the Tampa Bay market for all consumer services - voice, TV, broadband and now security.

"Bright House Networks' system does provide home security, it also helps users manage and monitor their energy, lighting and home appliances via the touchscreen. The security cameras connect to the touchscreen via Wi-Fi, while the rest of the peripherals in a home are connected to it via ZigBee." [CED Mag] BHN has a similar system as Cox, Comcast and TWC.

Big Mac versus Hamburger

May 7, 2012

VoIP Termination Squabble

May 7, 2012

On April 5, 2012, Sprint filed a petition for declaratory ruling raising a number of issues concerning the applicability of tariffed access rates to Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP)-originated calls. (Issues that the FCC should have already put to bed!) Basically, "Sprint is asking the FCC to decide whether it should pay CenturyLink for VoIP long-distance traffic. The question stems from a long-running federal lawsuit - filed in Nov. 2009 - CenturyLink filed against Sprint to enforce access tariffs on VoIP-originated calls." [fiercetelecom]

One of Sprint's points is: "because the VoIP originated traffic is jurisdictionally interstate, intrastate access tariffs cannot impose compensation obligations with respect to that traffic, even if those calls originate and terminate in the same state."

Cincinnati Bell to Spin Off Data Centers

May 4, 2012

Last week when asked, I said that I did not see Cincinnati Bell spinning off its data centers. One reason was that the ILEC would be left with a declining wireline business and debt, which was the reason that CinBell had pursued a data center acquisition -- to offset the line losses.

This week, CinBell announced that it will examine spinning off Cyrus One as a REIT (real estate investment trust). The IPO will bring in much needed cash to pay down debt - $2.5B.With the data center business up 21% to $53M, CinBell is expanding the data center space.

Transactional Agents Called Names

May 4, 2012

Over at CP, the transactional agents are being called Prostitutes and Zombies in opinion pieces. I find that sad considering that the Zombie comment comes from a guy who whined because he couldn't make huge commissions off call centers any more.

The one thing that most of these opinions neglect is that the World of Telecom is all about Transactions. It is a business based solely on Arbitrage.

Is it Cloud versus Agents?

May 2, 2012

Is it Cloud versus Agents?

As an Agent, I sell bandwidth and transport almost exclusively. I am learning that the Channel does not want that business. The carriers do, but on the wholesale/carrier side.

What Competition?

May 1, 2012

In this article about independent ISP's fading away, CenturyLink talks about competition of ILEC DSL - from cellular 3G/4G, muni Wi-Fi, and cable. There's also fixed wireless in some ares from independent ISP's, but that is mainly in areas without competition.

But competition is a myth today. VZ is co-marketing with cable now.

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