Peter : On Rad's Radar?
Peter
| Peter Radizeski of RAD-INFO, Inc. talking telecom, Cloud, VoIP, CLEC, and The Channel.

July 2012

You are browsing the archive for July 2012.

It Isn't Easy Being an Agent

July 31, 2012

Tonight at a networking event I met a former VZ employee - a channel manager for the last 5 years. He told me he was going to be an Agent to put his telecom knowledge to work to fund his life's endeavors. He kept going on about dabbling in the agent thing part-time. Picking up a project here or there.

8.5 Things the Olympics Taught Me About Sales

July 31, 2012

Do you want to be a world class sales professional? I do.

Do you want to win gold? I like ink and checks.

Here's how to be like an Olympian.

Cloud Outages

July 31, 2012

I have seen this headline a couple of times in the last month: Cloud Customers at the Mercy of Providers! It's just ridiculous. We left a five-nine world a while ago. Redundancy does not fix everything.

Verbal One Year Contracts

July 31, 2012

ATT has verbal one year contracts available. New service ordered within a few minutes for clients via an Authorized Solution Provider (agent). [This has to be for really simple stuff like POTS and DSL.]

However, ATT doesn't send any TAC (terms) or even welcome information to the customer. There is also a failure to mention that the verbal contracts auto-renew for 2 additional one year terms; thus, it's really a 3 year agreement!

Comcast Hits 300MB

July 25, 2012

Comcast rolled out Xfinity Platinum service with speeds of 305Mbps down and 65Mbps up for about $295. It was designed to compete with VZ Quantum FiOS, which is 300Mbps down, 65Mbps up, and $205 per month in the Northeast. Xfinity Platinum will include free Xfinity Signature Support (27/4 tech support and a personal consultant), a secure wireless gateway, and the Constant Guard Security Suite.

In some areas Comcast is doubling the speed for its existing tiers.

Why We Don't Have Customer Service

July 24, 2012

You Can't Win on Price

July 24, 2012

Another call today about a cable company stealing the deal because they are giving away the network. You can not compete on price!

The RBOC's have ceded the sub-$500 wireline market to the cablecos. VZ wants to clip the copper, which would destroy the DSL market - what there is it of it.

It's Re-Fi Month

July 24, 2012

The CFO's must have seen the low mortgage rate that Mark Zuckerburg received and decided the capital markets were friendly.

There is a lot of debt in telecom - some of it is refinanced for better terms, some to push the expiration date out (which means it can't be repaid under the original terms of the loan), and some of the debt is extended to help pay for operations (like payroll).

Strategy Matters

July 24, 2012

"When everyone is playing the same game, your execution is critical." - Seth Godin

"the way you go to market, the structure of your offering, the model of your business--these are sufficient to cause you to lose, regardless of how you play the game."

It's like he was talking about telecom, the ultimate me-too industry. It is even me-too in service delivery - which means it largely sucks.

Is Cloud Just Hype?

July 23, 2012

On Mergers

July 20, 2012

7.5 Things Affecting the Channel

July 18, 2012

There have been some changes in the Channel. Agents need to pay attention because this will result in even more changes in the Channel!

  1. Windstream laid off their Channel Chief, Dan Sterling. Windstream has been trimming the management fat this year.

Top 10 Risks of Telecom

July 17, 2012

Ernst & Young has a report out about the Top 10 Business Risks of the Telecommunications sector. The big one is thinking voice is still going to be the bread winner. Cellcos have gotten the memo that it will be all data all the time for profits. Top US Cablecos understand that too, I think.

VoIP Moves Part 296

July 16, 2012

Women in Tech

July 16, 2012

We need more women in telecom/tech*. The industry took a step closer today when Marissa Mayer, VP of Google, became CEO of Yahoo! She joins Meg Whitman, CEO of Hewlett-Packard Co.; Virginia Rometty, CEO of IBM; Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook; and Larissa Herda, CEO of tw telecom.

A search found not many female tech CEO's.

What's Up With Level3?

July 16, 2012

What's up with Level3? Not its income or free cash flow. (But its long term debt is up to $8.426B).

The acquisition of Global Crossing was going to fix all of that - or so they said.

The Fight Over Spectrum Dominance

July 16, 2012

It looks like the FCC is going to approve the Verizon acquisition of the SpectrumCo - cable companies alliance - spectrum. Competitors are hoping for conditions on the deal, including conditions on the marketing deal that the joint-venture is designed for.

Sprint's concern to the FCC is about equal access to cablecos for tower backhaul. I wasn't aware that the cablecos had a huge stake in the tower backhaul business.

A Parable about Outsourcing

July 16, 2012

Good Washington Post article that talks about Outsourcing.

Outsourcing works because the firms pay less and don't have to deal with unions or pension plans.

"Simply by having more experience, a specialty contractor is also more likely to hit upon the most efficient and effective ways of doing things and can quickly adopt those improvements throughout its operations." [in theory]

"The second big advantage that outsourcing firms enjoy is the economies of scale." - due to Specialization.

HT Picks Off Big Competitor

July 12, 2012

In many ways, Wavecom was as big a competitor to the incumbent carrier in Hawaii as Oceanic TWC. A facilities-based CLEC, an ISP, a wholesaler and a Hosted PBX player. That's four areas where it was a thorn in HT's side.

Hawaiian Telcom (HT) is acquiring Wavecom Solutions Corporation for $13M.

Electrons Firing Randomly

July 11, 2012

Here are some random thoughts for your weekend.

  • IBM moved from hardware to Services
  • UPS moved from shipping to Logistics;
  • Dell is moving from hardware to cloud services.

Service Providers have to migrate from Pipe to Business Services.

It is no longer about the boxes - cardboard or otherwise. It's about what people can do with the boxes that you provide.

Various Tidbits

July 11, 2012

Two of my pals work at Counterpath. It went on NASDAQ today. Congrats! "CounterPath Corporation (OTCBB: CPAH) (TSX-V: CCV), an award-winning provider of desktop and mobile VoIP software products and solutions, today announced that its common stock will commence trading on the NASDAQ Capital Market on July 11, 2012.

Good News from CenturyLink Channel

July 10, 2012



Sat in on the CenturyLink Channel Alliance - Get back in the Game Roadshow in Tampa this morning. It was nice to see Stacy Conrad from Microcorp; Josh Anderson and his co-workers from Telephony Partners; Dale Tucker from CCA; and put a face to an old Qwest SE, William Hobbs, now a CCA Emerging Sales Technology Consultant (ETSC) for Florida. Hobbs did a nice job on Why VPDC and The Benefit of Cloud over Colo. The roadshow had 3 parts (Hobbs did part 2):

  • New Savvis-CenturyLink Phase II Rules of Engagment overview;
  • Cloud/Hosting Solutions portfolio;
  • Third Party Data Center Updates/E-Line;

Dale Tucker went over the Rules of Engagement, You definitely need charts and glossaries to follow along the categories and acronymns.

Masergy Buys Broadcore

July 10, 2012

I knew Broadcore was in play, just like many of the Cloud Communications Alliance members. Masergy has a strategy to be more than an MPLS reseller. Picking up Broadcore gives Masergy

"Demand for business-class cloud communications is growing at a rapid pace.

8,016 Reasons to Offer MDM

July 5, 2012

All About Low Price

July 4, 2012

I write about Low Price a lot.

While reading a trade journal, it got me thinking again about why this industry sells on price.

My thoughts:

You go low price because you either don't want to take the effort to sell or you suck at sales.

A Moment About Phones

July 3, 2012

Tom Keating wrote a review of Panasonic's Android IP phone, model KX-UT670. It has HD Voice, speaker phone and integration with IP cameras. Tom reminds me that it's the "major IP phone vendors like Aastra, Cisco, Polycom, ShoreTel, snom, and others all use their own proprietary, relatively closed operating systems," while NEC and Panasonic are rolling out unique phones.

NEC has the Android phone that CloudTC showcased a couple of years ago.

The Sales SWAT Team

July 3, 2012

Zayo Group announced the formation of a dedicated team focused on Small Cell and Fiber to the Tower (FTT) initiative (in this press release). That's a good idea. In fact, when RAD-INFO INC is consulting on mergers between TDM companies and cloud companies, this is one approach that we have used.

There are different types of salespeople.

What's Up With Private Line?

July 2, 2012

"Private lines are leased point-to-point circuits, which are used for a variety of applications including connecting enterprise locations and backhauling cell towers to mobile switching centers," according to Insight Research.

"The $39 billion US private line services market is expected to show modest 2.3 percent annual growth over the next five years, as demand for higher bandwidth private lines offsets the shift of lower bandwidth private lines to packet-based services, says a market analysis study from Insight Research."

I have no idea how that will happen, unless they also include Ethernet, which the ILEC's do NOT.

AT&T and Windstream won a special access docket at the FCC, but without a vote.

The Mobile Master Agent

July 2, 2012

There is a lot of chatter in the Channel about Transactional agents being replaced by VAR's and Consultative Agents. I see Master Agents having to do a similar dance real soon.

Tech Data is one of the largest VAD (value added distributors) in the world. Most VAR's have an account with TD to buy hardware.

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