Frontier has completed its 14-state systems conversion related to its 2010 acquisition of Verizon’s wireline operations, Frontier said. The conversion was done in three stages. The West Virginia operations were converted concurrent with the completion of the acquisition in July 2010. In October 2011, all acquired operations in Indiana, Michigan, North Carolina and South Carolina moved onto Frontier’s operating systems and the acquired operations in 13 states moved onto Frontier’s financial and human resources systems. This month, acquired operations in Arizona, California, Idaho, Illinois, Nevada, Ohio, Oregon, Washington and Wisconsin were successfully moved onto Frontier’s legacy operating systems.
The FCC is waiting to hear from CenturyLink and Qwest about the kinds of conditions they would accept for approval of their deal, commission officials told us. Approval is not “imminent,” but the fact-finding has wrapped up, the officials said. The deal is reaching “the home stretch,” Stifel Nicolaus analyst Rebecca Arbogast wrote Friday, but a government shutdown remains “a threat.” She added, “We expect the FCC will impose duties” on the combined company “in certain areas -- including wholesale performance and broadband deployment/adoption, some of which could resemble previous conditions on CenturyLink-Embarq and Frontier-Verizon -- with additional obligations possible, but not as onerous as critics want.” CenturyLink’s acquisition of Qwest has been approved by all but four states involved, Arizona, Washington, Oregon, and Minnesota. The buyer is confident and has set an April 1 goal for final approval. The companies fully expect to have to comply with broadband deployment conditions, but are waiting for the FCC to lay out other conditions, a company official told us this week. “Further … concessions could speed the process, but extensive wrangling over final conditions -- or even a congressional fiscal impasse and federal government shutdown -- could slow it,” Arbogast wrote. The FCC is considering net neutrality obligations similar to those imposed on the Comcast-NBCU deal and is considering whether to ask the merged company to give up Universal Service Fund money, commission officials and a public interest advocate told us. The acquisition still faces resistance from CLECs including Paetec, which wants guarantees that the combined company won’t discard Qwest’s legacy operating system for at least three years. Negotiations among the companies continue but have not progressed, officials of each told us.
The FCC is waiting to hear from CenturyLink and Qwest about the kinds of conditions they would accept for approval of their deal, commission officials told us. Approval is not “imminent,” but the fact-finding has wrapped up, the officials said. The deal is reaching “the home stretch,” Stifel Nicolaus analyst Rebecca Arbogast wrote Friday, but a government shutdown remains “a threat.” She added, “We expect the FCC will impose duties” on the combined company “in certain areas -- including wholesale performance and broadband deployment/adoption, some of which could resemble previous conditions on CenturyLink-Embarq and Frontier-Verizon -- with additional obligations possible, but not as onerous as critics want."
FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski appears to be using Qwest-CenturyLink merger conditions as a “trick shot” way of regulating broadband without reclassifying the service, Cardozo Law Professor Susan Crawford, a former Obama administration telecom adviser, said Thursday. “He’s going to try to get through merger conditions what another regulator would try to get through regulatory authority,” she said.
Cbeyond, Integra Telecom and Socket Telecom have urged the FCC to impose conditions on CenturyLink’s planned purchase of Qwest to require the combined company to guarantee wholesale service quality, provide CLECs with conditioned copper loops and prevent the company from increasing special access rates or canceling special access agreements. The comments filed Thursday replied to a Sept. 29 letter from CenturyLink saying that a settlement with Sprint, Paetec, Mediacom, Cox and 360Networks in Iowa provides a model for relations with CLECs.
Washington’s Utilities and Transportation Commission conditionally approved the purchase of Verizon’s landline network by Frontier, the agency said late Friday. The transaction has been approved by regulators in Arizona, California, Nevada, Ohio, Oregon and South Carolina. “We're pleased the Commission has acted and approved the transaction,” said Tim McCallion, president of Verizon’s West region. “We are now evaluating the order and the unique circumstances underlying the conditions."
Frontier Communications’ proposed acquisition of Verizon networks in Oregon received approval late Friday from the state Public Utility Commission. But the regulator imposed a series of conditions in addition to settlements negotiated earlier between Frontier and the commission’s staff and other intervenors. The company is embracing all such stipulations with enthusiasm, said spokesman Stephen Crosby.
Ohio’s Public Utilities Commission voted Thursday to approve the Verizon/Frontier deal with stipulations that include the threat of financial forfeit for non-compliance. The stipulations, to which the companies, commission staff, and intervenor Comcast agreed in December, include a detailed protocol for Frontier and Comcast to follow in cutting over.
Ohio regulators should turn down the proposed sale of Verizon landlines to Frontier Communications as contrary to the public interest, said the Communications Workers of America and the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. In a brief filed Friday with the Public Utilities Commission, the unions said the agreement is “wholly inadequate” even with negotiated commitments. Ohio commission staff, the Office of the Ohio Consumers’ Counsel, Verizon and Frontier agreed to the stipulation Dec. 8, a day before a scheduled commission hearing on the deal.
The National Association of State Utility Consumer Advocates asked the FCC to impose an additional financial condition on Verizon’s proposal to sell 4.8 million access lines in 14 states to Frontier. The deal would triple Frontier’s size. NASUCA asked the commission to also require Verizon to provide the $3.1 billion in financing that Frontier has identified as needed to complete the transaction.