Frank and Atin, thanks for the thoughtful, reasoned responses. They certainly were informative! I think Frank hit on the crux of the whole issue and states my sentiments:
"In advance of the standards being ratified by te Forum, there are some non-standard adaptations of this in some of Nortel's Core and Edge products, as well as by others, and they are highly efficient for those carriers and SPs who use them. It's a little early to predict what the impact of this technology will be..."
I think the reason you are having mergers like WCOM/MCI happen is that there is a scramble to consolidate/control the Internet backbone and control IT with an "SS7 type" of device. Hopefully a standard will be reached and we can discuss here what the fallout is and who the biggest beneficiaries will be. I was thinking Lucent might have the best advantage, in both corporate might and technical expertise - but I am just going by gut at this point, I haven't invested.
Atin, you reiterated what my fear was - for each category, you have "others" at the end of the list - I would add "many" to that word. The truth is, there are many players and the field is going to be even more highly competitive going forward, regardless of what standard, if any, that evolves.
If these facts make FTEL investors angry, I'm sorry. I'm not trying to be harsh, I just want specifics on what technology will win out, and why - I haven't heard a clear and convincing argument yet for any IT company. That's MHO.
regards,
Louis |
