Once upon a time in the 1970’s there was a giant monopoly controlling virtually all of the communications in the United States. It was such a detriment to technological progress that the government spent millions of dollars and more than a decade to break up the company.
Looks like the breakup didn’t take.
AT&T Inc. announced plans yesterday to buy BellSouth Corp. for about $67 billion in stock in a deal that would reassemble large swaths of the old “Ma Bell” local-telephone monopoly but is likely to win regulatory approval because of growing competition from mobile phone, cable and Internet telephone companies.
The merger would dramatically expand San Antonio-based AT&T, which is already the largest phone company in the country, by extending its local-phone service into 22 states and giving it full control of Cingular Wireless, the largest mobile phone company in the nation.
Like it or not, Ma Bell is comin’ back!