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

telco

The Job Market is Hectic

December 1, 2014

Now that Level3 has officially eaten tw telecom, I assume layoffs have commenced, although I have not seen an announcement about them. Windstream let 350 workers go on Black Friday. With AT&T hoping to acquire DirecTV and the Comcast-TWC-Charter deal still in approval limbo, there are a plethora of layoffs coming in Q1 2015.

While observing the number of telecom execs exiting telecom for start-ups, solar, smart grid and other industries, I have to wonder if there are any opportunities left in telecom.

The Battle Over LERG, LNP

October 8, 2014

At Comptel Plus Neustar was campaigning against the old Telecordia to keep its contract for LERG and other databases.

A little history of Neustar: in 1996, "Neustar - then the Communications Industry Services (CIS) operating unit within Lockheed Martin - won its original contract to provide local number portability services to select regions throughout North America. Since that time, Neustar has assumed LNP responsibilities for all geographic regions throughout the United States and Canada as the operator of the Number Portability Administration Center (NPAC). Neustar subsequently launched wireless number portability to much of the North American market in 2003.

The Not Unusual Alteva Dilemma

September 3, 2014

A private equity group that owns 6% of Alteva made a play to buy it all and take it private. That move failed. The most interesting comment Rob Powell made was this: "[Alteva] has been seeking a future in hosted UC, where it has found solid growth but no profits yet."

When you look at the INC5000 for revenue numbers for many hosted players, none are clocking the ball out of the park, despite years of trying.

Are You a Red or Black Ant?

August 28, 2014

Dave Matthews Band's Ants Marching has been in my head all morning.

"When all the little ants are marching Red and black antennas waving we all do it the same we all do it the same way"

Reminds me of telecom.

Seth Godin wrote this morning, "There is no more everyone.

A Quick Look at Telco Revenues

August 21, 2014

A short take on telco revenues including Earthlink, Windstream, Frontier, Verizon and AT&T. Is it the price revenue squeeze on telecom? Or is it the revenue dip associated with cloud services that have a lower ARPU than TDM ARPU?

"Windstream revenues decreased 2.4% year over year to $1.466 Billion in the second quarter. Data center and managed services revenues, which total approximately $31 million, increased 20 percent from the same period a year ago." [source]

"Service revenues fell 27.7%, while Product revenues reduced 8% year over year.

Head Count Down for the Count

August 15, 2014

The other concern at ITEXPO was all of the layoffs in telecom. The number of telecom jobs has dramatically shrunk in the last 4 years - and is still shrinking.

As the industry looks at even more consolidation from these big 3 moves - Comcast-TWC, DirecTV-ATT and L3-twt. How many synergies will be let go with this M&A?

Structural Separation via REIT Equals Zero Taxes

August 5, 2014

Windstream got the endorsement of the IRS to transfer their assets - copper and fiber plant - to a REIT and lease those assets back to the telecom corporation. In the process, Windstream will save a ton on taxes. That's awesome.

If it flies, the other ILECs - ATT, C-Link, VZ - will be right behind them.

The Mammoth Model

August 5, 2014

I received the rather sporadic newsletter from Mammoth Networks today. While reading it, I noticed that the evolution of Mammoth is very similar to many other ISPs.

"Like most early adopters of broadband, Mammoth Networks started with DSL as our only product. We focused our efforts from 2005 to 2009 on our DSL and ATM platform, sprinkling T1s into the network at times."

Telecom Transitions in Rural America

May 15, 2014

I notice that with the changes to the USF program (transition from paying for voice lines to broadband); the end of broadband stimulus dollars; the end of inter-carrier compensation; and the TDM-to-IP transition the IOC (independent telephone companies) community is in a huge state of flux. It's federal funding is dwindling while it has to make big shifts in tech and business models.

VARs, VADs, inter-connects, CLECs, even Agents have been in turmoil as business models have had to morph. The entire telecom ecosystem is shifting.

Things That May Interest You

April 24, 2014

There are a bunch of things that I want to comment on but just don't have the time. Yet they may be of interest to you. I did get to comment on the FCC's net neutrality ruling and the Cbeyond-Birch merger.

For one thing, I hope that the CBEY-Birch deal doesn't become the Fairpoint-VZ deal.

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