EXECUTIVE
FORUM Brian Crawford, President, Trans-Caribbean Cable Company With 13 years in the undersea cable industry, Mr. Crawford has worked on more than 15 different undersea cable projects around the world, gaining experience in all aspects of undersea cable network design, planning, construction, operations and maintenance. Formerly with AT&T Submarine Systems (now Tyco Telecom), AT&T Communications, Pacific Gateway Exchange, and New World Network, Mr. Crawford now serves as the President of TCCC.
Are business conditions improving or getting worse, and are you optimistic or pessimistic about the future? Conditions are improving in general and we are optimistic about the future. Do you see any signs of recovery in the undersea cable industry in the short term or the long term? There are certainly signs of recovery as evidenced by the growth of the TCCN consortium to more than 50 operators, but there are still plenty of under-utilized cables out there that need to find long-term users. Without the stable support of long-term users, the future of such under-utilized cables will remain questionable at best. In any case, there seems to be significant demand for capacity that remains unsatisfied by the capacity reseller model, soon to result in some new consortiumowned cables in our view. What are your views on the future of the undersea cable capacity market? Will capacity lease rates stabilize or continue to decline? What about the IRU? In the long-term, I truly believe that all undersea cable operators are doomed to fail if their business models are completely dependant on the wholesale capacity market. As certain networks begin to capture more and more long-term users, it will become even
more difficult for the others to cover their costs, forcing additional rounds of bankruptcies, restructurings, and further reductions in the rates of leases and IRUs. In particular, the IRU, which was originally conceived as method to transfer network capacity among consortium operators prior to the introduction of upgrade technologies, will continue to lose popularity much the same way that an IRU loses its value in market where prices continue to fall. We understand that there were two licenses awarded at the end of 2004 by the government for the construction of new cable systems into Jamaica, one to Fibralink and one to TCCN. Do you think that Jamaica really needs two cable systems? If not, then why do you think that you will be successful versus the competition? I agree with the reports published Pioneer Consulting and other analysts which all seem to indicate that the entire market demand for Jamaica will be less than 10 Gbps during the next five years. Obviously, based on such reports, two cable systems are not required, but both could still be successfully built. After that, it then becomes a question of long-term survival. The consortium typically takes a long-term, low risk approach whereas a private developer may accept a short-term, higher risk approach. You have indicated before that the TCCN consortium was considering the purchase of New World Network, the majority owner of 7