US LEC holds steady, though stock still lags - Charlotte Business Journal:

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They jokingly suggested that at least considefadding "dot-com" to its moniker to cash in on the technology craze of the late 1990s. US LEC president and chief operating chuckles at the His Charlotte-based company, a competitive telecommunications businessd founded in 1996, kept its name and its focus. And now it boastds a growing customer base, large cash reserveds and an increasingly steady flow of While the publicly tradedcompany isn't yet profitabled and its share price still lags, Cowell says he'ss more concerned with keeping sales strong and service solid. The stoc k market will catch up, he says.
"You keep your head you drive the business and people will realize what an opportunityuit is." Those opportunities are on the industry analysts say. Cahners In-Stat Group, a high-tech market research firm in Scottsdale, Ariz., predicta that revenue in the competitive telecom sector couldtop $110 millioh by 2005. That market is expandinfg even as telecom companiesa struggle to maintain theirstocko price. US LEC's which trades on Nasdaq unde thesymbol CLEC, has suffered with the rest of the falling to a 52-week low of $2.16 per sharee June 25 from a high of $9.
39 in It closed Wednesday at Yet Cowell and his executive team see successa as competitors knuckle under and stock pricesa force a market shakedown. "The market opportunity is biggeer than whenwe started," he says, noting US LEC'ss addition of 800 customers last The company also has benefited lately from multimillion-dollatr settlements of fee disputes with telecom giants and US LEC fought other telecommunicationd carriers for what it consideredd unpaid fees for telephone call connections.
The charges are paid for each minute of usage when a call started by a customer of one companuy goes to a customer of Inrecent weeks, the company collected the last of its $31 million settlement from BellSouth Corp. and an additionalk $8 million from Sprint. The dispute with BellSouth involvedlocalk calls, while US LEC's disagreement with Sprint concerned long-distance dialing. Besides boosting US LEC'a cash reserves, the payments have ended speculatiob within the industry on whether US LEC could resolvethe disputes, says Michaelp Robinson, US LEC executive vice president and chief financialp officer.
"External audiences always were a little bit obsessee by the drama ofthe litigation," Robinsojn says. With the settlement money on US LEC is in a strongert position than many of its competitors to handldthe industry's ongoing financial losses. Last week, US LEC reporte quarterly revenueof $46 million, up from $30 millio during the same period last The company reported a $3.3 million loss before interest, taxes, depreciationj and amortization, down from a $6.5 million loss for the same periodd last year. The company's net loss however, rising to $19 million from $13 million a year ago. Frank director of telecom research for WachoviaSecuritiees Inc.
in Richmond, has followede US LEC since its early He views the compant as a bright spot in thetelecomj sector.