The future development of the information superhighway is under threat by unstable alliances between the world’s major telecommunications operators, believe senior executives at the top 100 telecommunications and cable firms, more than half of whom were chief executives of $5,000m a year companies, according to a survey by Andersen Consulting. The alliances include the British Telecommunications Plc-MCI Communications Corp Concert venture, AT&T Corp’s WorldPartners, Unisource BV and the France Telecom-Deutsche Telekom AG Atlas partnership. Nearly all respondents said the superhighway will only be successful where large companies team with new entrants to the market. But only 2% believed the long-term prospects for these alliances were excellent, with 30% rating them as good. The majority, 54%, said the chances were only fair, and 9% thought they were poor. Ben Andradi, associate partner at Andersen’s UK strategic services unit, said the survey reveals widespread scepticism that the current upsurge in merge rs and alliances will yield lasting success.
