And so the M&A merry-go-round whirls even faster in the fairground of the US telecoms and media industry. The end result looks likely to be a realignment of the sector, with cable and mobile players forming alliances against the big two telcos. The question is, which cablecos, and which MNOs, will join forces? French-based cable group Altice, which has already acquired Cablevision and the smaller SuddenLink, is now making a real power play and reportedly preparing a bid for Charter (which has itself swallowed up Time Warner Cable and BrightHouse). However, to afford a price which could reach $185bn, according to Wall Street analysts, Altice (with a market cap of about $23bn, and almost that amount in debt) is likely…