Article Excerpt:
TWST: Would you begin with a brief historical sketch of Consolidated Communications Illinois Holdings and give us a picture of the company at the present time?Mr. Currey: The Illinois property was founded by our current Chairman's great-grandfather in 1894 and was run by the Lumpkin family until 1997 when it was sold to McLeodUSA. In early 2002, Mr. Lumpkin wanted to reacquire the company and he put together a group consisting of himself and two private equity firms, Providence Equity and Spectrum Equity. They entered an auction for the Illinois business, were successful and reacquired the company in December 2002. The business was put together as an acquisition platform. We felt we had the resources, both intellectual and capital, to successfully acquire assets and grow the business. We were originally formed to look at RBOC lines that might be spun off or sold. Then in mid-2003, TXU Corporation, the energy conglomerate in Dallas that had been in the telecom business since 1997 or 1998, put up its telecommunication assets for sale. We entered that auction and were the winner. We closed that transaction in April 2004 and tripled the size of the company. We remain at that size today. We're now in the mid-to-late stage of integrating the two companies. We are organized functionally as one company operating in two states.
TWST: Would you describe your core businesses and your related
businesses?
Mr. Currey: We are primarily a local exchange carrier providing local,
long distance, Internet, and data services in parts of Illinois and
Texas. We are the 15th largest local telephone company in the United
States. DSL is our lead product, with over 90% of our lines being DSL
capable. This past year we launched the 'triple play' in Illinois and we
are now offering video service or IPTV to a large part of our Illinois
customer base. In general, our markets are split two-thirds residential,
one-third business. In addition to our core telephone operations, we
also have several strategic telecom-related subsidiaries. Those
businesses collectively provide call completion services, operator
services, telemarketing and fulfillment services and telephone equipment
sales and service. We also run a directory advertising business and
fiber network business.
Tickers included in this excerpt: CNSL
TWST Newsletter
For more information call (212) 952 7433. The Wall Street Transcript does not endorse any of the comments made by interviewees, and does not make stock recommendations.