Broadbandits: Inside the $750 Billion Telecom Heist - Softcover

Malik, Om P.

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0471660612 ISBN 13: 9780471660613

Publisher: Wiley, 2004

Synopsis

Investigating the financial fraud and misguided power plays that brought down the telecom industry

Once the foundation of the Dow and NASDAQ, the telecom industry has eaten up more capital than any other industry in recent history and has nothing to show for it. Today, it is by far the worst culprit in the spate of financial dirty dealings that have been splashed across the business pages, and yet the rewards reaped by top executives at many of these failed or failing companies have been inversely proportionate to their decline. Broadbandits takes readers behind the scenes to get the story they won't get in the media. Investigative reporter Om Malik follows the money trail and deciphers the actions and motivations of a generation of new economy "barbarians" that brought down this once lucrative industry. This intriguing book offers an inside look into the telecom bubble, with tales and anecdotes about mavericks who turned simple light and glass fibers into veins of gold, financiers who got greedy and fleeced unsuspecting millions, clueless venture capitalists who thought they'd tapped into the mother lode, hapless entrepreneurs who believed that they were changing the world, and self-proclaimed pundits who were cheering it all on from the sidelines. Broadbandits is a compelling account of the downfall of telecom giants such as WorldCom and Global Crossing, and will show readers how many telecom upstarts and veterans alike became victims of what one chief executive aptly described as "high-yield heroin."

Om Malik (New York, NY) is a Senior Writer for Red Herring who focuses on the telecommunications sector. Prior to joining Red Herring in July 2000, he was senior editor at Forbes.com. His work has also been published in newspapers and magazines such as The Wall Street Journal, Business 2.0, Brandweek, and Crain's New York Business. For a very brief while, he was a venture capitalist.

About this title

About the Author

OM MALIK is a Senior Writer for Business 2.0 in San Francisco, California. Prior to joining Business 2.0, he worked for Red Herring and Forbes Online, where he was a senior editor. An award-winning journalist, his work has also been published in newspapers and magazines such as the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Brandweek, and Crain's New York Business. For a brief while, he was a venture capitalist.

From the Back Cover

Praise for Broadbandits

"Broadbandits weaves together a story of greed, money, power, and crime to reveal to the millions of people who lost their investments in telecom stock where, and to whom, their hard-earned dollars went."
Charles Dubow, Executive Editor, Forbes.com

"Om Malik has the courage to write that instead of reporting EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization), the CEOs he calls broadbandits reported their own style of EBITDA (Earnings Before Irregularities, Tampering, and Dubious Accounting). His pen is as wicked as Mark Twain's."
Blaise Zerega, Managing Editor, Wired magazine

"Rare for a book in its field, Broadbandits is an attractive, stodge-free read. Accessible, even mischievous, it should prove instructive not merely to geeks, (disgruntled) venture capitalists, and bankrupt telecom tycoons, but also to that species most neglected of all the lay reader."
Tunku Varadarajan, Editorial Features Editor, The Wall Street Journal

"Broadbandits is a fast-paced tale of the key players responsible for inflating the telecom bubble. Many were fools, many others rogues, some managed to escape with riches, some were ruined. With an unforgettable cast, Broadbandits is a sobering account of monumental financial waste and the derailment of hundreds of thousands of lives."
Andrew Odlyzko, Director, Digital Technology Center and Assistant Vice President for Research, University of Minnesota

"Broadbandits weaves together a story of greed, money, power, and crime to reveal to the millions of people who lost their investments in telecom stock where, and to whom, their hard-earned dollars went."
—Charles Dubow, Executive Editor, Forbes.com

"Om Malik has the courage to write that instead of reporting EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization), the CEOs he calls broadbandits reported their own style of EBITDA (Earnings Before Irregularities, Tampering, and Dubious Accounting). His pen is as wicked as Mark Twain's."
—Blaise Zerega, Managing Editor, Wired magazine

"Rare for a book in its field, Broadbandits is an attractive, stodge-free read. Accessible, even mischievous, it should prove instructive not merely to geeks, (disgruntled) venture capitalists, and bankrupt telecom tycoons, but also to that species most neglected of all—the lay reader."
—Tunku Varadarajan, Editorial Features Editor, The Wall Street Journal

"Broadbandits is a fast-paced tale of the key players responsible for inflating the telecom bubble. Many were fools, many others rogues, some managed to escape with riches, some were ruined. With an unforgettable cast, Broadbandits is a sobering account of monumental financial waste and the derailment of hundreds of thousands of lives."
—Andrew Odlyzko, Director, Digital Technology Center and Assistant Vice President for Research, University of Minnesota

Edition details

• Publisher: Wiley
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0471660612
• ISBN 13: 9780471660613
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 354