Fodder for Vonage's IPO Prospectus
It wouldn't be surprising to see Vonage's PR folks and investment
bankers furiously cutting and pasting from TeleGeography's new report
on the U.S. VoIP market in the second-quarter. Vonage continues to be
the leading voice-over-broadband provider with 28% market share. The
market has grown to 2.7 million customers from 440K in Q2 2004, while
revenues are expected to be more than $1-billion this year compared
with $250-million in 2004. While Telegeography notes that cablecos such
as Time-Warner and Cablevision have posted “blistering” growth this
year and collectivley have more customers than Vonage, it said Vonage's
growth has been “remarkable by the standards of any industry: Vonage's
subscribers have more than tripled in the past 12 months.” That strikes
me as excellent fodder for anyone trying to raise $600-million from an
IPO soon.
Andy Abramson, who has been talking for some time about Sprint acquiring Vonage, was quick to post today that BusinessWeek
is now touting the same line. Olga Kharif believes Sprint's lawsuit
against Vonage is so vague and lacking substance that is likely a ruse
for Sprint to get a better idea about the worth of Vonage's
intellectual property portfolio before it makes a bid. I'm thinking
Vonage CEO Jeff Citron is so anxious to create a liquidity event he's
probably willing to dance with Sprint legally if it leads to an
acquisition.
