8x8 - a.k.a. the other VOIP service provider - posted a loss of $5.7-million on revenue of $3-million in the third quarter, while the number of Packet8 customers rose to 40K from 26K in Q2. The company has a market cap of $132-million. It means each subscriber is worth $3,300. If the same valuation is applied to Vonage, it works out to $1.3-billion. Is 8x8 over-valued, or is Vonage really worth this much, or is the market's true value?

I guess my meanderings about whether Bill Owens will be supplanted as Nortel's CEO have struck a chord. I got an e-mail from the company with following comment: "Bill Owens has said many times that he is proud to be the CEO of Nortel and is excited about our future prospects and growth opportunities." I still think Peter Currie has come back to the fold to become CEO one day, which doesn't entirely conflict with Nortel's comment.

Will SBC spend US$15-billion to buy AT&T? Now, that would be a mega-telecom deal. If the deal is consummated, it would combine AT&T's 30 million long-distance customers with SBC's 50 million local customers, and mark the end of AT&T's 120-year history.
SBC would not be buying AT&T for its LD business, which has been under competitive pressure for years. The real prize would be AT&T's extensive data network, which has been the focal point of CEO Dan Dorfman's plan to re-invent the company. The data network's potential let Dorfman justify AT&T's decision to leave the local [circuit-switch] telephony business. Instead, AT&T is jumping on the IP bandwagon by offering VOIP service to consumers and a variety of value-add services to corporate customers.
An SBC-AT&T marriage would be a blockbuster and a real test for the FCC's new chair, who will replace Michael Powell.

Peter Currie, who was Royal Bank of Canada's CFO until last September, has re-emerged as Nortel's new chief financial officer. It appears to be positive move because Currie was the company's CFO from 1994 to 1997. Currie has a good reputation within Canada's corporate ranks, and his appointment can only give Nortel some much-needed credibility. The big question is whether the CFO job is just a warm-up zone for the CEO job.

Aliant sure has a nice way with the numbers. The company plans to save $40-million a year through a voluntary early reitrement program, and spend $40-million over the next three years to launch an IP-TV service over its high-speed Internet network.
The move into TV is a strategic necessity if the Atlantic Canada carrier wants to stay competitive with Eastlink, the country's seventh-largest cableco, which offers a bundle of TV, high-speed Internet, VOIP and wireless telephony.
Before Aliant became engulfed in the BCE Inc. empire, it was known as NB Tel, and had a reputation for being among the most innovative carriers in North America. NB Tel was playing around with interactive TV service long before IP-TV became the next hot thing for carriers. BCE shelved the project because it owned its ExpressVu satellite service. It's too bad Aliant wasn't left alone to operate as a test lab for BCE and Bell Canada