No. QWST, LVLT, etc., own the plant and receive rent on it. They benefit from more use, but they will be cash cows once they have their long hauls fully built, and so will be very secure holdings. They will also benefit in stock appreciation because it will take 10 years of dynamic growth to cable in the world's long haul even under exponentially rising ability for unit strand to carry data. QWST, etc., are excellent investment grade long term holds, and will vary only to the extent that they can effectively compete, because a rising tide raises all boats.
The situation is that the more capacity that is available the more is demanded. Demand will continue to outstrip the ability to supply for the foreseeable future. It is like the ability to supply in bps/meter^2 is rising at the square of area covered while the demand is rising at the cube. The reason is discovery of usefulness and interactivity. Eventually the contribution from discovery will level off, but interactivity has no apparent growth bound.
If all these guys would get off their collective dimes and duffs, a mere HFC upgrade at a suitable scale would eat all the promises of WDM alive. That technology simple isn't good enough. In fact, the Pure solution will become critical within several years just about when it will be starting to be implemented in scale on a QoS basis. I can't blame the operators and carriers too much because the FCC has introduced a major factor of profit uncertainty. If they weren't in the way, you'd see the greedy capitalists out there building the continental fiberway. |
