September 2024 Buy-Sell Wavelength Report

Advice For Buyers

• Very little SWM5 and AAE1 capacity on the key Marseille/Singapore route. Moreover, the Peace Cable is still 4 months away, and SWM6 at least 6 months out. Blue-Raman's Marseille/Mumbai segment is scheduled to go live November, 2025. 
• Plenty of Equiano capacity so now is the time to grab it over the next 6 months. I know several vendors holding 500Gs to multiple terabits ready to cut a deal. 
• European wavelengths have never been cheaper. It is now possible to build a basic 100G European backbone that includes 10x 100G waves for 10K Euros or less per month. So now is the time for African ISPs to expand their networks into Europe to peer and buy better transit. I have intimate knowledge of pricing, latency, resiliency, and physical diversity options across the major long haul European providers. My expertise will save a lot of time as well as avoid costly mistakes. 
• The badass 240 terabit per second Firmina cable is coming to South America and it will crash prices. A Google project, I expect a quarter of the cable's capacity to be sold to wholesale market fibre optic networks. 
• Pacific cable capacity shortages are everywhere. You get a reasonable price, you take it immediately. Shopping around simply tells the seller you don't know the market. And it is self-destructive. You will lose the capacity. 

Advice For Salesmen

• Too many of you are chasing resale deals. What is the real likelihood that the purchasing manager is unaware that you are reselling? And how many resale deals do you win? Your professional success depends on securing new logos and wisely using your time. Farming a few accounts that your manager gave you does not make you a good salesman. Take it from an independent sales agent like myself who did almost 2 terabits of Layer 1 capacity since July 1st. My clients are smaller, entrepreneurial ISPs with Big Dreams. Focus on Tier 2 Internet entities that have their own ASN, buy some transit, but are rapidly expanding their Layer 1 networks. Layer 1 growth is typically driven by the need to peer, expand network coverage or buy upstream transit. 
• You winning an IRU deal is about likely as Roderick Beck winning the Boston Marathon. Ok, I admit, a little more likely. 😀 Furthermore, IRUs are not particularly profitable for the sellers.  Standard accounting practice classifies them as capacity sales and not as revenue stream except for the annual O&M charges. Carriers sell IRUs not to generate profits, but to make their balance sheets more liquid. Google paid for the Topaz cable and is now issuing fibre pair and spectrum IRUs to generate cash and recoup the couple hundred million dollars it spent on it. Putting cash back back on its balance sheet 
• Creating a loyal customer is easy. You work hard for them. You get them great deals. You never sell them a bad product or something vastly inferior to the market. I know a sales guy that sold Linkedin a $10K GigE back in 2007. Across the Irish Sea. Once the buyers realized after the fact that the price was 3x above the market, he never got another order. Focusing on your short term personal gain will kill you long term. Your reputation is the ket ingredient in a successful career.  
• You should treat sales as a profession. Know as much about the industry, your products, your market, the technology, and the employer's network as possible. A pleasant personality and a quote is not enough.