Excite could have bought Google for $750,000 in 1999

Homer says it all!

This just made my day because any opportunity I have ever passed up pales in comparison to this.  Even Yahoo! passing up to buy Google in 2002 is not as bad as this.. 

Hindsight 50/50 is always clearer, BUT WHAT WAS GEORGE BELL THINKING?

Passing up buying Google for $750,000 is 1999 is.. well..  NUVT – nuts.

Google now has a market cap of $160 billion.  Yes Dr. Evil,  B—I—L—-L—I—O—N!

Tech Giants in Acquisition Frenzy

Channel Insider has a great article about lots of merger activity in the tech industry.. 

From HP buying 3Com and Palm, to Oracle buying Sun Microsystems to SAP buying Sybase, cash rich technology companies are on a shopping spree to expand into new markets as they prepare for economic recovery. Even Novell has put itself up for sale. And Brocade reportedly investigated the market for its own sale last year. Here’s what’s behind the trend.

Check out the full article here: Tech Giants in Acquisition Frenzy

Coresite files for $230m IPO

Datacenter Dynamics reported this morning that Coresite is filing for a $230m IPO.

Big news in the colo sector..  Think this is further vaslidation that the colo market is continuing to heat up.

Read full article here: Coresite Files for $230m IPO

Level 3/Global Crossing Merger???

Our friends from Telecom Ramblings wrote about their thoughts on the likelihood of a merger between Level 3 Communications and Global Crossing.   

See full post here: M&A Journal: Thoughts on the Likelihood of a LVLT/GLBC merger

There is also on article on The Fly on The Wall about it too..

It will be interesting to see how this plays out in the the coming year. 

Level 3 Global Crossing?  As a telecom sales guy, this sounds like a mess but as a client, it sounds pretty enticing.  Massive network, diversity, etc. 

What do you think?

Qwest Catalyst to examine service delivery

Courtesy of Connected Planet

As service providers consider their place in the value chain, they want to become trusted intermediaries for both enterprise and consumer services. To maintain and build their ties to the customer experience, they have to be capable of micro-segmentation of services that are packaged in such a way that it is their brands that deliver a good experience.

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Cincinnati Bell acquisition spurs global data center expansion

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BT teams up with OnLive for online games

Courtesy of Total Tel

American Fiber Systems Launches Enterprise Communications Tool

Leading optical fiber network provider, American FiberSystems (AFS), announced today that it has launched The Fiber Connect Blog to support enterprise level fiber network metro area customers.

The new Blog (www.afsnetworks.com/fiberconnectblog) will be maintained by the AFS team to provide viewers with relevant news about company-wide initiatives, educational posts about the Telecom industry, customer success stories, and details related to the 10 major metropolitan markets they serve.  With information about network upgrades, planned downtime, road construction and real-time local topics, AFS anticipates this Blog becoming a “go to” resource center for all of its customers and partners. Read more »

Thursday Metro Bites: euNetworks, Integra, Level 3, and AFS

Courtesy of Telecom Ramblings

Here are a few comments on some of the news in the metro fiber space today:

European metro fiber operator euNetworks reported earnings this morning.  Revenues climbed to €8M, up 14% over last year which is quite a reasonable clip considering the economic headwinds.  Gross margins of 80% reflect the company’s increasing focus on its fiber assets, as the percentage of revenue derived from network services rose from 75% last year to 98% in the latest quarter.  It has now been a year since CEO Brady Rafuse took the helm, and the company seems ready to make a bit more noise this year. Read more »

Zayo Group charts steady growth in the first quarter

Courtesy of Fierce Telecom

Key acquisitions and a bit of churn in its bandwidth unit played roles in Zayo Group’s generating a modest $58.9 million in revenue for Q1 2010, about $700,000 more than Q4 09 and a 5 percent annualized increase. However, the bandwidth and network infrastructure service provider carefully pointed out that its revenue increased $20.5 million over the third quarter of 2009 and that compared to the first quarter of 2009 revenues rose 53 percent, from $38.4 million.

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