CenturyTel to buy Qwest in $10.6B stock swap

Source: USA Today

NEW YORK (AP) — CenturyTel (CTL), the country's fifth-largest local-phone company, said Thursday that it will buy Qwest Communications International (Q), the third-largest, in a stock swap worth $10.6 billion to gain the benefits of scale in a shrinking business.
The combination would have about 18 million phone lines serving customers in 37 states, but would still be dwarfed by AT&T and Verizon Communications. The company will be based at CenturyTel's headquarters in Monroe, La., rather than Denver, where Qwest is based.

The number of telephone landlines in the U.S. shrinks about 10% per year as consumers chose to rely on wireless phones or service from cable companies. The fourth-largest provider of landline phone service in the country, by number of subscribers, is now cable company Comcast.

The acquisition continues a trend of consolidation in the landline business. But neither Qwest nor CenturyTel, which does business as CenturyLink, own wireless networks that can compensate for the loss of landlines, as AT&T and Verizon do.



Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/telecom/2010-04-22-century-tel-qwest_N.htm

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I searched DU for this announcement, but found nothing. I hope it's not too late to post it. Dana ; )

I see absolutely no upside in having my phone company based in Louisiana. Fuck fuck fuck.

to Denver.

If they don't, we're SOL.

Qwest ran my FiOPS two years and we finally signed up with them after unable to get DSL working.

It has been a great two years.

Hope it continues, and the contract I hold with Qwest must be honored - it is a lifetime contract.

I don't remember the details, but they did promise us the same price even after upgrades.

We tried cable for a while but it was awful. Dropped out all the time and I'm positive they were throttling us, even though I think they're not supposed to do that anymore.

I remember when we first got Qwest high speed and they did a customer service survey, I told them that it pained me to tell them that I was thrilled and had no complaints whatsoever, lol.

I don't see how any of this is better than Ma Bell would have been.

I worked for USWest for quite a few years. When Qwest bought USWest, they tried to end all of the pensions. That would have been devastating to all of those people who worked for AT&T/USWest all their lives and depended on those pensions for survival. The USWest Retired Employees Association (or some such name) went to court and forced Qwest to keep paying the USW pensions, although with no cost-of-living adjustment.

Mine is small but extremely welcome, given that I've been unemployed for almost a year. I wonder if we'll have to go through this again, and if the courts will side with the plutocrats this time around.

CenturyTel is a horrible company.

We dumped them several years ago because their service was poor and their prices kept going up.

CenturyTel is good at monopolizing markets. We couldn't switch to another company like the communities that surround us can. They had the municipal contract for all homes.

We had to go broadband and use VOIP to escape CenturyTel. Since then Time Warner acquired the cable company we were with and now we have that monopoly to deal with.

I feel for anyone who is stuck with CenturyTel.

CenturyTel is a horrible company. If you can find an affordable alternative like a combination of internet via cable or satellite and cell phone instead of landline, you should go for it.

for my 12m speed and they actually offer me something higher for the same price.

I pay $51 for the silver package.

Hawkeye-X

Will have to give a shout to see what is up.

who may lose their jobs.

I survived downsizing after mergers but just barely.

I just switched to Quest TWO WEEKS AGO to escape Comcrap. :(

It is over funded. I wonder how this will go?