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Strategies & Market Trends : Graham and Doddsville -- Value Investing In The New Era -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: porcupine --''''> who wrote (1006)	11/18/1998 10:51:00 PM
From: porcupine --''''>	Respond to of 1722

AT&T targets wholesale growth opportunities NEW YORK, Nov 17 (Reuters) - AT&T Corp. is gearing up for an aggressive expansion of its relatively minor presence in the $10 billion-12 billion wholesale telecommunications services market, a top Ma Bell executive said Tuesday. AT&T Business Services president Bob Annunziata, speaking at the Warburg Dillon Read telecommunications conference here, said wholesale services -- providing services and network capacity to other telecommunications providers -- have "never really been embraced by AT&T before." The company has a current market share of no more than 20 percent, or about $2 billion annually. But Annunziata said AT&T, the nation's largest long distance phone company, wants to increase that revenue base "in excess of 15 percent a year." "Wholesale is a new area of emphasis for AT&T," he said. Annunziata is a one-time AT&T executive brought back into the Ma Bell fold earlier this year when AT&T bought the telecommunications startup he founded, Teleport Communications Group Inc. Annunziata said most of the top Teleport brass have stayed with AT&T and the infusion of Teleport's entrepreneurial spirit has been "sprinkled throughout" AT&T's notoriously conservative ranks. "We're looking forward to the new leadership with a new team," Annunziata said. "We're playing offense." He also said AT&T is on target to meet $1.1 billion in cost saving and revenue synergies it had said would be derived through the Teleport combination. Those will be realized next year, Annunziata said. With the addition of Teleport, AT&T is well positioned to continue expanding into the local phone service market. In the third quarter, Annunziata said, AT&T added about 75,000 local access lines and would continue to match that growth. AT&T shares rose 1/4 to 61-3/16 in heavy trading on the New York Stock Exchange. ((Dan Burns, New York Newsdesk 212 859-1700))