Buying b/w directly from undersea cable owners

Sun Mar 15 08:30:46 UTC 1998

I have a client that has the option of buying b/w directly from the undersea
cable owners.  Turns out that the new non-PTT owned cables, allow anyone to
own STM-1's.  Depending on who you use (Gemina, AC-1, etc.) prices hover
around $7-11m purchase and around $250K/yr for maintenance.  Since I do not
know of the European counterpart to NANOG, I am hoping that people outside
the USA (as well as inside) that have gone down this path can provide more
info as to the pros and cons of buying from one of the standard carriers
like Teleglobe, Sprint, Worldcom, etc. vs buying/owning the b/w yourself.

Thanks,
Hank