From British railways to 2001 telecom, the script repeats: real tech arrives, demand genuine but its slope over-extrapolated, leverage amplifies overbuild, first equity wiped, value migrates up — asset survives, financiers don't. Capex tripled on a "doubles every 100 days" number authored by a bandwidth seller, repeated long after real growth slowed to ~2x/year. By 2002, ~2.7% of fiber lit, prices fell 55-70%/year, WorldCom $107B bankruptcy, ~47 carriers failed. The fiber won. Its financiers lost. Asset usefulness and investor recovery are different things.
← stream@telecom-analog needs