Bad pipe dreams

Waking up as the CEO of a Dutch communications company must be something akin to the film Groundhog Day - you're not quite sure how things are going to go badly, but you are sure that they will, and that you'll wake up to face the same prospects tomorrow. Today's Het Financieele Dagblad carries an interview with the CEO of MSO Casema (they want you to register and pay for this article, by the way), in which he seems to concede that the company can't be a viable long-term player on its own. His stated preference is to be acquired by a telco, and the three he identifies are KPN (which used to own Casema before being forced to dispose of it in the late 90s), as a faster route to FTTH, Belgacom and BT. He also muses on the possibilities for teaming up with a mobile player, and of national MSO consolidation in the Netherlands.