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Technology Stocks : Global Crossing - GX (formerly GBLX) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Frank A. Coluccio who wrote (1536)	8/24/1999 9:39:00 PM
From: Teddy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 15615

Thanks again, Frank, for the sharing another of one of your fascinating stories. As i usually do, i read your post several times, laughing out loud at the appropriate parts, and (after looking up the words that i didn't know and practicing their pronunciation) spending time thinking about what to do with my new found wealth of information. Anyway, it was towards the end of one thinking session that i perceived an important reason why Global Crossing purchased C&W's Global Marine unit. There are, of course, several hypothesis (other than bragging rights) why Global Crossing bought the world's largest and most experienced submarine cable maintenance and installation company. Getting the long-term contracts for servicing a third of the world's undersea cable kilometers... covering cables built for 100- plus carriers, including AT&T, NTT, Deutsche Telekom, MCI WorldCom, British Telecom, Cable & Wireless, Telstra and Singapore Telecom is one rationale. They have already shown that they plan to use the largest flotilla of cable laying and maintenance in the world: 15 cable ships, 3 installation barges... worldwide workforce of 1,200 people to add to the already announced Global Crossing network and also to build networks for other companies (such as AFRICA ONE) in exchange for cash and capacity. And, as was mentioned on this excellent thread, it ties up some equipment that could be used by the competition to build rival networks. There probably are other good answers too. Anyway, the thing i thought of comes from the end of your story: ...Another thing that has caused a lessening of these occurrences was the end of the cold war, since many of the fishing trawlers weren't really doing any fishing at all. Use your imagination. Well Frank, i have a lot of imagination. Ready? Good. Global Crossing has a cable going to Japan. Some of the countries in that area are not too friendly with each other right now. A couple of weeks ago there were even a couple of, ugh, let's just call them “off shore incidents.” I think a couple of countries over there even had strong ties with the loser of the “cold war.” So what does that have to do with the purchase of Global Marine? Well, in addition to the largest flotilla of cable laying and maintenance in the world: 15 cable ships, 3 installation barges... worldwide workforce of 1,200 people, Global Marine also includes 22 submersible vehicles. My imagination thinks that at least a few of them might be making the rounds at cable landings and possess the capability to send a non-fishing trawler caught dragging anchor straight to the bottom.