[heisenbit]

The reasons the network equipment suppliers consolidated was that the network service providers had consolidated and were starting to buy in bulk. That forced the prices down and gave advantages to the larger players who stayed larger players by gobbling up the other players before a competitor could.

The key problem is differentiation for network access providers. The business is highly infrastructure intensive and at the end of the day you take an IP packet, ship it to an interconnect and collect monthly payments. It is hard to see how such an industry where innovation is centered around bundling of tariffs for different access technologies is able to run more fragmented network technologies in cost effective ways.

So this is imho. all support PR to justify funding general EU tech investments. The US has venture funds the EU has research grants.