According to MuniWireless and Fierce Wireless, the rural wireless industry is about to lose one of its more visible alternative pillars. Open Range, which two years ago had lined up $100M in private equity and $267M in subsidized government loans, seems to be in the process of imploding. CEO Bill Beans has resigned and ‘massive’ [Read more →]
O’Hara Takes the Helm at Integra
October 6th, 2011
Western CLEC and fiber operator Integra Telecom has a new face in charge. Kevin O’Hara has been named executive chairman, taking over the CEO duties from Tom Casey who has left to become CEO of Tronox. O’Hara has been on Integra’s board for two years and its chairman for [Read more →]
Steve Jobs Dies
October 6th, 2011
As everyone surely knows by now, Apple’s Steve Jobs passed away yesterday. While the event was not unexpected – pancreatic cancer does not leave many survivors – it certainly makes one stop and look back on the last three decades and realize just how [Read more →]
Colo Catchup 10/5: Telecity, Windstream, Savvis, Orange, NTT
October 5th, 2011
Time to catch up quickly on the colo and cloud happenings: [Read more →]
M&A Journal: Primus For Sale
October 5th, 2011
Primus Telecommunications Group (NYSE:PTGI, news, filings) said yesterday that it has hired Jefferies & Company to explore various strategic alternatives. Primus’s strongest businesses are in Canada and Australia, but they also have the low margin former Arbinet IP and voice exchange business they bought earlier this year as well as some customers in the US and Europe. The list of alternatives under consideration goes on at length: [Read more →]
Kennedy Gets Its Gigabit Fix From Fibertech
October 5th, 2011
Northeastern fiber builder Fibertech has been largely operating under the radar this year, but yesterday they unveiled a deal down in my neck of the woods. South Jersey’s Kennedy Health System selected the company to upgrade its connectivity, bringing a diversely routed Gigabit Ethernet ring into five of its major locations, plus dark fiber into [Read more →]
Level 3: Shifting Gears, Harmoniously
October 5th, 2011
Now that Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings) and Global Crossing are now one, the focus moves on to the integration in the US and to a lesser extent in Europe. On that subject, the company is quite consciously putting forth a very different public foot [Read more →]
Zayo, Megapath Connect To Telx’s Ethernet Exchange
October 4th, 2011
Colo and interconnection specialist Telx added two more companies with very different styles to its Ethernet Exchange so far this week. [Read more →]
Level 3 Closes Global Crossing Deal, Plans Reverse Stock Spit
October 4th, 2011
Just a week shy of the 6 month anniversary of the original announcement, Level 3 has closed its purchase of Global Crossing. The combined company had $6.2B in revenue and $1.3B in EBITDA pro forma (before synergies) for 2010, and they still anticipate $300M in opex savings from synergies. It will have 165,000 route miles of fiber, 30,000 being in the metro, and a presence in [Read more →]
Metro Bytes 10/4: tw telecom, Fairpoint, Sidera, Tech Valley
October 4th, 2011
With CompTel this week, everyone’s got something interesting going on, but nobody’s got time to read them all. Here’s a quick survey of some of it from the metro and regional connectivity side of things: [Read more →]
Rostelecom, AlcaTel Lucent to Deploy 100G Between Europe, Middle East
October 4th, 2011
The 100G locomotive is gaining traction overseas for Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE:ALU, news, filings), which said yesterday that it is helping Russian telecommunications giant Rostelecom establish a ‘superfast connection’ between Europe and the Middle East. The upgrade will see coherent 100G technology put onto [Read more →]
Spread Networks Intros Bulk Services, Sells a Big Chunk to Sidera
October 3rd, 2011
Low latency bandwidth specialist Spread Networks is introducing sales of ‘managed bulk bandwidth’ on their leading NYC-Chicago routes. And they’re not playing around, as Northeastern fiber operator Sidera Networks has signed on for 250Gbps at a round trip latency of 16ms. They’ll be paying a fixed monthly fee on a long term contract plus [Read more →]
XO Taps Sprint for MVNO Services
October 3rd, 2011
With an interim CEO now at the helm, XO Holdings (news, filings) made an interesting move today. The national CLEC and fiber operator is will be tapping Sprint for MVNO wireless services, including their Wholesale Mobile Integration services. XO will be offering various wireless products to its SMB customers including both 4G and fixed mobile convergence. [Read more →]
Network Roundup 10/3: AboveNet, Integra, MegaPath, Level 3
October 3rd, 2011
CompTel is this week. Let’s quickly catch up before the flood of announcements begins. [Read more →]
First Communications Lights More Fiber
October 3rd, 2011
first-communications is lighting more of its dark fiber holdings. The company’s assets include both intercity and metro fiber across the Midwest and the Northeast, including a diverse entrant in the low latency markets between New York and both Chicago and Toronto. Today’s announcement adds the Chicago to [Read more →]
Verizon Steps to the Plate, Challenges Net Neutrality
October 3rd, 2011
In this fall’s least surprising lawsuit, Verizon on Friday fired off its best shot at the US Court of Appeals. They contend that the FCC overstepped its authority in setting up such rules, and basically suggest that the FCC should just butt out of everything related to the internet. You can’t blame them for taking a big swing though, otherwise this one would be too easy to justify the cost of the legal team they’ve put together. And this is Verizon’s responsibility right now, as its fellow [Read more →]
Ramblings Jobs: Optimum Lightpath
October 1st, 2011
Another new posting on the Ramblings’ Jobs Board this week in the vibrant Northeastern bandwidth market. [Read more →]
More Brazilian Progress for Global Crossing
September 30th, 2011
Another week, another deal for Global Crossing down in Brazil. Today they reported an expansion of their arrangement with BRQ IT Services. BRQ uses the network operator’s managed WAN to connect its data center with 2500 employees spread out amongst the [Read more →]
Poll: Is the Economy Dragging on Internet Infrastructure?
September 30th, 2011
The news these days is full of doom & gloom over the macro economy, but it is not yet clear in just what form that is going to show up in the numbers. The internet infrastructure segment overall weathered the last storm quite well compared to the rest of the economy, but are we prepared for a double dip if it happens? Is there enough surplus inventory in the bandwidth and datacenter markets to even permit a slowdown in spending? Here’s a Friday poll aimed at taking the market’s temperature ahead of earnings season: [Read more →]
Could regulation stifle m-payments?
September 30th, 2011
This article was authored by Michael Carroll, and was originally posted on telecomasia.net.
Plans by the European Commission to probe bank’s efforts at self-regulation for electronic payments contain a stark parallel with comments by [Read more →]
FCC, DOJ Finally Give Level 3 and Global Crossing the Green Light
September 29th, 2011
It took five and a half months, but Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings) finally got what it has been waiting for. The FCC and the DOJ have now approved the company’s purchase of Global Crossing. The two companies now say they may complete the merger as early as next week. Certainly they won’t waste any time. Actually, I had always thought the timing might work out for an October 1 close – it had always seemed like a likely target date for all concerned. [Read more →]
Colt Offers Integrated Encryption via Ciena, Mails Iceland a Datacenter
September 29th, 2011
Pan-European network operator Colt Group (LON:COLT, news) is adding integrated data encryption to its enterprise managed services. It’s a feature of packet-optical gear from Ciena (NASDAQ:CIEN, news, filings), in which ‘in-flight’, protocol-agnostic encryption can secure data streams without impacting network performance itself. [Read more →]
Easynet Taps Telefonica for Latin America
September 29th, 2011
Easynet Global Services is teaming up with Telefonica International Wholesale in order to better reach Latin America. The agreement means the VPN MPLS services of the two companies will be connected, greatly expanding Easynet’s coverage in the region and letting them provide services in [Read more →]