The round table consists of four members from four different companies dealing in finance. James Dodd, of Oriel Securities, acting as Chairman.  Participants include Cyrus Mewawalla, an independent analyst, Torsten Thiele, of Investec, and Richard Lukaj, of Bank Street.

The question of how the telecoms industry can make money on the internet was raised.

“The only people who aren't making money are telecom industry,” says Mewawalla.  This is mainly because of regulations.  This led to a distortion where telecom companies aren't willing to invest in infrastructure.

Net Neutrality distorts markets because two parties benefit from the internet,  content providers like Apple and users. But users are paying for it, while content providers aren't heavily sharing the cost.

“Net Neutrality will collapse.”  In countries where market forces rule, net neutrality will collapse, and economic advantage will fall away from providers like Apple and Google, and fall to telecom, according to Mewalla.

Dodd's next question was to Thiele.

“The financial process has had a particular impact on the industry.”  According to Thiele, the world has been left where new players are rising in the banking sector that will continue to change the landscape.

Dodd asks Lukaj “Do you think that sort wave of interest is going to present itself in investment in the subsea world?”  This is referring to a new trend to buy up telecoms companies.

“The suboptic industry, in large measure, is the mate you seek which delivers everything it said it would do,” Lukaj said.  He admits it's difficult to talk about the subsea industry in the macro scale because so many projects are different and regulations seriously complicate it, making overarching statements difficult.

He admits that there is a suggestion that there will be movement in the industry in the coming years.  It is particularly difficult to sell single components of a company because they are so integrated.

“The panel would suggest we're open for business,” Dodd says.  To summarize the general comments of the panel, the economic meltdown of 2008 is recovering, and the climate is in a better state than it has been in years.  Lukaj states that this is especially true for credit.

“If you ask me who's the first to scrap Net Neutrality, it's going to be the UK,” Mewawalla said.