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Technology Stocks : Winstar Comm. (WCII) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: SteveG who wrote (3689)	2/4/1998 10:38:00 AM
From: Roger Bass	Respond to of 12468

<..MSFT "not interested" in acquiring telephone companies:..> MSFT has a fairly clear view of its strategy, and what it does and does not do. IMNSHO... 1) They are interested in controlling key pieces of 'platform' infrastructure: this means essentially software. 2) In some cases, a piece of operating infrastructure may be key to their obtaining this platform control. In such cases they may be prepared to invest. Comcast and MSFDC are both such cases, though they differ in an important respect: a) The Comcast deal was about getting a key customer who already had a large customer base for their cable OS offer, to create pressure on others in the industry to follow b) MSFDC aims (in vain, in my view) to establish very high market share in a key electronic commerce service platform (ie one that that many others would use in building a certain kind of service) MSFT is not interested in being 'just another player' in competitive service businesses. Telecommunications is pretty much that kind of business, whatever the advantages one player may have for a while. So I can't see any way Microsoft would be interested in investing in spectrum auctions. Roger.