On the regulatory front, regional phone companies should act in the aftermath of a recent federal court ruling that tossed out many telecommunication rules stemming from the 1996 Telcommunications Act, Whitacre said. In practice, he said SBC does not look any different to its customers in the aftermath of the ruling, but it is scrambling to upgrade its network with "last-mile" fiber-to-the-curb deployments in neighborhoods and digital switching upgrades in its core network.
The "fiber-to-the-neighborhood" option is far more economical and realistic than fiber to homes for delivering DSL, voice-over-IP, IP television and other converged services, he said.
SBC is investing close to $6 billion to deliver fiber-to-the-neighborhood in the next few years, Whitacre said.
Subsea cable alternatives can provide a level of comfort for those concerned about disruptions. Realistically, they will continue to play a small, but critical role in the short term.
Maintaining existing network infrastructures often incurs huge technical debt before newer technologies are adopted over time.
Amid ongoing regional uncertainties, telecom infrastructure in the Middle East has expand to include terrestrial low-latency network infrastructure, which offers resilience and agility in navigating political complexities without relying solely on undersea networks.
