back to article CenturyLink set to merge with tier-one provider Level 3 for $34bn

American telco firm CenturyLink has announced a merger with tier-one networking business Level 3. The deal is worth $34bn, including debt, and will see cash and stocks traded as CenturyLink acquires Level 3's fibre-optic capabilities in a deal intended to close by Q3 2017. Unanimous approval from both companies' boards of …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Telco hell

    We just escaped from CenturyLink and went to Level 3, now this. It's like a building another wall on the prison ... No one escapes Stalag 13 !

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Telco hell

      That's being kind to CenturyLink, a/k/a The Devil Incarnate. They will impose their "old subsidy whore telco" thinking on Level 3, which means they will stop cooperating with wholesale customers, try to undermine the VoIP business (huge for Level 3, detested by CLQ) since it hurts traditional telco revenues, and they'll substitute lobbyists for engineers. It will seriously hurt the Internet as we know it.

  2. Mark 85
    Meh

    Does this mean that CenturyLink will slowly kill of the fiber and move everyone to DSL? Yes, I am being snarky as DSL is all that most of their customers can get. Bah... a pox on them.

  3. Frank N. Stein

    Great. Just great...

  4. roger stillick
    WTF?

    Rural USA has no Level 3

    Out here on The NW Oregon Coast we had QWEST w/corroded out copper DSL and a cable service offering oversold internet service 56-300 Kb.. QWEST merged with Century Link 10 years ago and we now have 7 Mb DSL on fiber to the hub with aerial fiber to hubs in every place there is a group of customers.. Hubs in RV parks, Apartment complexes, rural subdivisions, and Subscriber Carrier terminals feeding local pots lines..

    Q= how does Level 3 get better than this ?? Do they really have universal fiber to the curb ?? Or, do they pick the available low hanging fruit ??

    IMHO= VOIP is not broadband, and Century link is a world spanning broadband carrier.. merging the 2 is simply synergy, or the combo will be much better than each alone.. RS.

    caveiat= i am a retired QWEST comm tech..

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