"On Wednesday, Quanta Services, one of the leading ditch diggers for fiber, said its telecom business had fallen by a third since December."
David - I agree with your comments. And another reason the "ditch digger" index is misleading is that, in all the ditches that were dug over the past few years, there is not only lots of unlit cable that needs photonics (as you point out), but there are many empty ducts that can take new fiber without digging up the street again. I think (and would appreciate your take on this) that GLW will, to some degree, be able to innovate its way out of this mess by developing new fiber that requires fewer, less expensive items of photonic gear, so that it is more cost effective to buy new cable and put it in existing empty ducts than it will be to put last generation networks together with old existing fiber.
GLW's other businesses give it the cash flow to stay in the game, and continue r&d (admittedly at a reduced pace - how seriously is r&d going to get hit, anyone know?). And, I just read in today's NYT that there is speculation Nortel may have to exit the optics biz entirely to survive - become a wireless company. |
