Craig Clausen Quotations

This time around, the conditions are much more favorable, plus I can't believe they're chimps. They've learned. They seem to be smart and savvy people. You have a couple of smart and savvy people, favorable conditions, and good things have a way of happening.

The question arises - would they have survived if they hadn't had any missteps in that perfect storm, if they had just stuck to being an ILEC serving their 100-year-old franchise?

It's good timing for their IPO. I think they were smart for moving now and not waiting much longer. I think it gives them the additional funding that they'll need to push deeper into other markets.

They would have been pretty well insulated, but they were doing what we should complement them for doing - exploring. They had seen the future. They have to go out of region. They have to expand. Otherwise, they're going to have this niche market that eventually is going to get squeezed by outside forces. Voiceover IP or something else is going to come and eat their lunch. So they took a pre-emptive strike that bit them in the butt the first time.

Number one, they have a stable leadership. The people that have been there have been there for a while. Sometimes that's good, sometimes that's bad. I think in this instance it's a positive for the company - given that these people have lived through one bankruptcy.