Wiltel, the backbone telecom company based in downtown Tulsa is being bought by Level 3 for almost $700 million, layoffs likely to follow.

That's unfortunate. Hopefully, Level 3 will get absorbed into an even larger company who wants to keep operations alive in Oklahoma.

That would be my guess as well, they plan on staying in Tulsa for at least two more years, and two years in telecom is a lifetime.

There are lots of companies that need a backbone, and that are going to have to get bigger, fast if they are going to be able to compete with the new AT&T and MCI/Verizon (whatever they decide to name it, but my money is on MCI). Sprint probably doesn't have a need for Wiltel/Level 3, but Bell South, all the cable companies getting into VOIP and any CLECs that survive are going to need the kind of infrastructure that this company has badly to be able to compete.