Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request From: "John R. Levine" Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom Subject: Re: Telephone Companies in the US Besides the RBOCs Message-ID: <2588@accuvax.nwu.edu> Date: 4 Jan 90 16:23:55 GMT Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu Organization: Segue Software, Cambridge MA Lines: 44 Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 5, message 9 of 12 In case nobody else tells you, here are the names of the RBOCs: NYNEX New York and New England Bell Atlantic middle Atlantic states BellSouth south east Ameritech northern midwest Southwest Bell Texas and southwest U S West mountain and northwest states Pacific Tel California and Nevada There were a lot more operating companies than this; U S West has merged all of its operating companies into U S West Communications, the rest still have the operating companies as subsidiaries, e.g. Bell Atlantic still has New Jersey Bell, Bell of Pennsylvania, Diamond State Tel (Delaware), and the Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone companies of, respectively, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, and the District of Columbia. This is a long list, several of the holding companies have only one or two operating companies. The various companies have taken different diversification strategies. BellSouth and Southwest Bell have bought into a lot of cellular telephone companies outside their home area, Bell Atlantic has bought software and computer maintenance companues, NYNEX has a chain of computer stores, Pacific Tel is in undersea cables, and U S West is doing all sorts of miscellaneous stuff. It is my impression that the ones that have stuck most closely to telephony have been the most financially sucessful. Two other of Ma's heirs that bear mention are: Southern New England Telephone most of Connecticut Cincinnati Bell small area around Cincinnati Ohio They were affiliates rather than subsidiaries of AT&T (i.e. AT&T owned a minority rather than a majority of the stock) and so are not subject to the restrictions placed on the holding companies, even though before the breakup they acted as part of the Bell System as much as anybody else. Regards, John Levine, johnl@esegue.segue.boston.ma.us, {spdcc|ima|lotus}!esegue!johnl