Telecom Ramblings

Here is a quick summary of several fiber contracts and expansions that have crossed the wires in the last few days:

Western regional fiber operator 360Networks finished a fiber build for Advanced Data Centers.  The build consisted of diverse laterals into the company’s McClellan Park facility, which sits on an former Air Force Base.  According to ADC, they can now offer low latency 2.3ms connectivity over to major datacenters in the SF Bay area while not having the same earthquake risks. [Read more →]

Windstream (NYSE:WIN, news, filings) is buying itself a bunch of fiber!  Today the rural ILEC announced that it has agreed to purchase Kentucky Data Link (KDL) as well as Norlight from Q-Comm.  The transaction is valued at approximately $782M, the components of which will be 20.6M shares of stock, $278M in cash, and the repayment of $267M in net debt.  From what I hear, this was not Windstream’s first offer, but rather its third.  Additionally, there were active private equity bidders in the mix, but [Read more →]

glbc offered up an interesting press release this morning.  TTX Company will be using their EtherSphere, IP VPN, and Dedicated Internet Access services to support operations across seven locations as well as backup services for their data center, displacing its previous provider.  TTX provides railcars and freight car management services in North America, which is not the kind of company one thinks of as needing bandwidth and high tech communications systems.  But I guess keeping track of 200,000 flatcars, boxcars, and gondolas in the modern age takes a modern IT infrastructure these days.  [Read more →]

Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings) chalked up two more wins over the past several days in the content delivery segment.  The company continues to prove out its return to revenue growth, which is at least giving their PR team a sustained workout.  Hopefully it will show up in their Q3 numbers when the time comes.

Today it was yet another victory in the gaming space with [Read more →]

Following three straight quarters of declines, XO Holdings (news, filings) turned around and posted some nice numbers in this afternoon’s release, which as always came on the last possible day.  The prior few quarters had featured slower growth in broadband revenues that didn’t successfully balance churn in legacy services.  Both sources showed measurable improvement, however questions over the company’s cash levels and plans to raise money remain in place.  Here is a quick table summarizing XO’s performance for Q2/2010: [Read more →]

According to the New York Times, the video site Hulu is preparing to go public.  Born as the major TV networks’ answer to YouTube, Hulu has managed not to crash and burn, which is what I thought was most likely at the time.  Reportedly the company generated $100M in revenue last year, and should be in the $200M range next year.  No word on the actual profitability of those revenues, but if they are indeed going public then soon that information will have to be filed with the FCC.   [Read more →]

Internet2 has received a donation aimed at a 100Gbps Ethernet networking project from Juniper Networks (NASDAQ:JNPR, news, filings).   The internet equipment maker has injected $2.5M that will go toward the building of the United States Unified Community Anchor Network, or US UCAN.  I like my acronyms without an apparent political slogan, but oh well.  Internet2 also won some stimulus funding for the project last month, with partners National LambdaRail, Northern Tier Network Consortium and Indiana University – $62M worth, which will be supplemented by [Read more →]

In today’s Q2 earnings report from euNetworks (news), one can see early signs of success in its drive to unlock the value in its metro assets.  The European marketplace is less mature for such assets than it is here in the USA, but that may be starting to change. Revenues rose to €9.4M, up some 18% from the first quarter alone.    There’s probably some lumpiness in that surge obviously, but they do certainly seem to be on the move.  Demand was particularly strong from the financial vertical of course, since despite its small size euNetworks is one of the major players in the low latency game between [Read more →]

This week’s big event was of course the Google/Verizon network neutrality proposal, which took heavy fire from the network neutrality camp – some seeing Google’s action as a betrayal.  Was it?  Well that depends on what one wants from the whole argument: victory, policy, or the argument itself.  Yes, there are those who would prefer (consciously or unconsciously) to leave network neutrality as a battlefield indefinitely, as it provides a useful us-versus-them division with easy access to the press.  In a very real sense, Google did turn its back on that group by attempting any sort of compromise at all.   [Read more →]

Integra Telecom is adding 121 route miles to its fiber network in Denver, looking to take advantage of growth opportunities.  The $2.1M metro expansion will allow the company to offer enterprise customers a more robust set of network offerings.  Since restructuring its debt last year, Integra has been gradually returning to a growth footing.  It has also been increasing its emphasis on its on-net footprint lately, most of which it picked up in the [Read more →]

Level 3 Communications (NYSE:LVLT, news, filings) has had three PRs this week:  a statement on the Verizon/Google proposal, a contract expansion with IPNETZONE, and connectivity into BATS Europe.

Regarding the Verizon/Google proposal, Level 3 was ‘encouraged’ that the two were able to find agreement on as much as they did, but nevertheless was doubtful that allowing last mile access providers to create paid priority data services was a good idea.  No big surprise there, or anywhere in the statement really.  Mainly I think the network operator and those like them are looking for [Read more →]

When you’re as big as Cisco Systems (NASDAQ:CSCO, news, filings) and your CEO has a reputation for a very optimistic view of the future of bandwidth, and the market depends on you to to balance the forces of pessimism, it doesn’t take much in the way of weak results to cause trouble.  In its fiscal Q4 results, Cisco beat earnings per share expectations by a penny, and came in with revenues of $10.8B – just below expectations of $10.9B.  It was above guidance, but in the strange game of Cisco expectations it was below par.  But really it was the forecast that has spooked people the most. [Read more →]

Yesterday, datacenter operator CoreSite announced two economic news services, Need to Know News and Rapidata, as customers in its facility at 1275 K Street in Washington DC.  No, not Ashburn or Reston, but rather just a mile from the government agencies that issue the economic data that the financial markets often hinge on in the city itself.  That proximity to the data plus connectivity to various fiber routes means that the news can reach the right ears in New York and Chicago more quickly. [Read more →]

Catching up once again on various metro fiber news around the country:

Down in Florida, regional metro fiber builder FiberLight turned out a customized network solution for Sago Networks.  Fiberlight deployed a 10G DWDM network hooking up the internet solutions company’s two Miami data centers, the Terrmark NAP of the Americas facility, and Peak 10 in just 24 hours.  FiberLight has thus far ignored the metro fiber M&A frenzy, and has instead been [Read more →]

Earlier this summer, we briefly posted a link to a long presentation and discussion by Allied Fiber’s Hunter Newby the Internet Society of New Yolk but that link turned out to be premature.  Well, they did it right this time, so for those interested in an hour’s worth of detail on just what Allied Fiber is up to in the world of dark fiber, here it is – with video even: [Read more →]

Ok, so you’ve been wondering where Telecom Ramblings has been with this Google/Verizon public policy statement, the leak to the NY Times, the denials, and the eventual announcement.  Well, to be honest I just don’t see much of a story here, just a constant rehashing of existing ideas in the context of diametrically opposed positions, a threat of something ambiguous happening that isn’t actually a regulatory framework, new law, or, well, anything of substance, and eventually a self-interested proposal by two players that nobody likes much.  But maybe it’s just me.  So here’s a quick poll for readers.  What do you think? [Read more →]

As regular as clockwork, TW Telecom (NASDAQ:TWTC, news, filings) has posted its second quarter financial results, showing solid revenue growth.  There was perhaps a bit stronger acceleration on the revenue front, however costs increased in parallel which held down EBITDA growth.  Since I have been looking for an acceleration in top line growth from the company, I am hopeful that they are gearing up for such a growth phase.  As always, here is a quick tabular summary of their results in the context of prior quarters: [Read more →]

Several items have passed by on the wires lately worth a mention:

Just this morning, rcn-metro announced a win in the financial vertical with Monadnock Capital Management, for whom they will be providing Ethernet connectivity between its Philadelphia trading operations and key financial exchanges in New York and New Jersey.  Monadnock’s President, Daniel C. Bigelow, mentioned the time-sensitivity of [Read more →]

There were two interesting network security announcements this morning aimed at the federal sector:

International network opertor glbc has partnered with Bivio Networks to deliver managed security to US Government customers.  Amongst other products, Global Crossing will leverage Bivio’s Continuous Threat Monitoring Solution.  They have been aggressively expanding their efforts in the federal marketplace this summer, having [Read more →]

Here at Telecom Ramblings, we have followed closely the rapid development of the Ethernet Exchange from the drawing board just twelve months ago into a competitive new marketplace with at least three entrants so far.  The latest of these of course is the combined effort of Telx and Neutral Tandem that was announced in June.  Telx has been focusing on interconnections between networks for a long time, and therefore their move into a similar business for Ethernet networks seems like a natural one.  With us today to offer Telx’s perspective on Ethernet exchanges and shed a bit more light on its plans going forward is the company’s CEO, Eric Shepcaro. [Read more →]

Metro fiber operator abvt continued its rapid growth through the second quarter.  Revenues, EBITDA, EBITDA Margin, and earnings per share all came in ahead of expectations.  In fact, the company’s guidance for the year now was too light, and therefore they had to raise it.  Here is a quick tabular summary: [Read more →]

The last few days have been a deluge of Q2 2010 earnings reports, here are a few comments on several of them:

Competitive service provider cbey reported Q2 revenues of $111.8M, up from $110.5M in the prior quarter.  That was a bit [Read more →]

Competitive carrier PAETEC (news, filings) reported earnings today.  The company has spent the economic storm mostly treading water when it comes to revenue, while striving to increase EBITDA margins through cost savings.  Those overall trends didn’t change much this quarter, which is summarized below in context of the prior quarters: [Read more →]