Articles By Bob Fletcher

Think you're too busy to blog? Think again. Or just ask your boss. After more than 100,000 miles in coach class this year (so far), my backbone may be aching, but the IP backbone market is as agile and dynamic as ever. Sales opportunities abound, but to take advantage, you'd better be savvy, and just a little cagey.

So, as our gleaming 777 departs Kuala Lumpur, I'll just relax in my fully-reclined, ultra-deluxe coach seat and tell you what this globetrotting sales guy has seen, heard and figured out.

1. Large eyeball networks (5 million+ subscribers) are selling paid peering to the largest content providers.
2. There are big price reductions in IP transit all over eastern Europe - now close to parity with western Europe.

Bob, the sales guy.

Ditched my #@!%$! cell in Stockholm. Verizon CDMA does not work in Europe! Upside: I now have a shiny, new World Edition Blackberry GSM/CDMA. I call it Trixie.

Road Tip: Just say NO! to mouth-searing kimchi or Indian curry for breakfast. No matter how polite you're trying to be.

With barely enough time to recharge Trixie after calls in Denver, Albuquerque, Stockholm and Bonn, I hopped a jet for Tokyo, Hong Kong and Kuala Lumpur. (Trixie and I barely made it out of KL alive. Cab driver must have been conserving gas; tried to piggyback car in front.) Beginning to feel like Marco Polo on 'roids, but I gotta check out LA and DC before catching a shuttle back home to Boston (close enough) .

Trixie is overloaded with commentary, observations, insider scoops, and . . . new NSP sales and marketing contacts! (Hey, I'm a sales guy.) Time to download and see what comes out . . .