VC can extract value by selling it on at an inflated valuation.
That's what SoftBank tried to do with WeWork. The company is worth 10 billion (or less) and they tried to sell it to the public markets at 40 billion. Had the public markets not noticed the weird shit going on inside the company and actually bought it at 40+ billion then SoftBank would've made a lot of money. The stock would then most likely decrease over the following years costing those that bought it in the IPO money.
This is why it's so important that public markets are strictly regulated and the SEC forces companies to publish all kinds of things before IPO.
Private equity and VC are generally interchangeable terms in that context. There's a difference between a VC that privately invites certain investors to invest, versus a publicly open mutual fund that anyone can buy into.
And to complicate matters even more, there are publicly traded private equity partnerships (Blackrock, etc).
Perhaps not mentioned (that i see thus far) is how density drives the economics of telecom network deployment. Network will be deployed (and upgraded) in direct proportion to the availability of revenue (homes passed)/dollar of capital investment. Those who live in high density cities will have abundant (1Gbs) and relatively cheap bandwidth. Most people living in remote, rural areas will not receive abundant (1Gbs) bandwidth unless someone subsidizes it.
I live inside the perimeter in Atlanta, GA, where ATT provides a 1Gbs fiber connection for $70/month. I just tested it at 878 Mbs down, 650 Mbs up. And that performance has been consistent for over 2 yrs, with no outages except after hurricane or ice storm.
Before that, Comcast couldn't deliver 25 Mbs and went down at least once a month, for hours at a time. Comcast now offers a 1 Gbs service here, but I wouldn't trust its reliability.
Chattanooga, TN has three plus private ISP's. The local power company (EPB) fought AT&T and Comcast tooth and nail to obtain its telecom services license from the City of Chattanooga/Hamilton County. EPB offers 1 Gbs for $68/mo, 10Gbs for $300/month - residential service - and according to family members, the service is excellent (TV and phone offerings also available). EPB offers 1Gbs service to 98% of the city. Neither At&T nor Comcast are close in coverage, but both claim to offer 1 Gbs service.
The key to EPB's success - they already owned the rights of way required for fiber infrastructure (electric grid), they had the capital to commit to the long term investment required for telecom payback (7-10 years), they deployed a fiber-based network from the outset, they hired experienced telecom people to run that business, and they were/remain a respected corporate citizen dedicated only to serving their local area.
Those rights of way are a key consideration often overlooked when outsiders evaluate telecom economics. LOTS of legal and regulatory (local, state, federal) hurdles involved in obtaining them if one doesn't already have them.
Algae bloom kills dogs in an hour or two. Numerous cases is Southeastern US this August. All swam in lakes/ponds/stagnant water. Casuses acute kidney or liver failure.
SMS operates via the SS7 protocol; SS7 protocol-based signaling occurs in a separate (side-band) channel of the voice-based public switched telephone network. It is used for call routing (setup and tear down) of a switched PTP connection, billing, other administrative purposes, and for the transmission of SMS messages. It existed long before (1970's) there was such a thing as SMS (developed in early 990's). Consequently, it is essentially free (from the marginal cost perspective that governs economic decision making in telecoms) to the carriers. I speak as a former RBOC and ISP executive who was heavily involved in financial decision making.
Prohibition was an extremist political movement. Widespread public rejection of it, in the form of stills, speakeasy and other means proved it to be a law without public sopport, resulting in its repeal within 10 years - an absolute public rejection of a limit unsought by the majority. OP pov has zero basis in fact.
