It's cheaper than having lots of real estate, people, etc. Nationwide coverage typically uses a few dozen real POPs, if that. CLECs save on the foreign exchange mileage. In most cases, even if they have to pay unbundled network element rates for T3s to get to the remote tandems or end offices, those are a tiny fraction of T1 FX tariff rates. 3850 Opinions are mine alone.
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