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The Angriest CEO in Telecom: SBC's chief can't stop fighting the government. Is that a good call?

Date: March 30, 2003
Author: Stephanie N. Mehta
QUOTE: Over the next six months the 61-year-old crisscrossed the country, waging what seemed like a one-man crusade to repeal federal rules that require SBC to resell its network at deep discounts.

ABSTRACT: Ed Whitacre, chairman and CEO of SBC Communications, is continuing his quest to persuade the federal government to repeal rules that force the communications giant to resell its network to competitors at a large discount. Whitacre claims that the rules, intended to facilitate competition in the local telephone market, are simply not fair and are hurting the company's bottom line. Not fair, because SBC owns the lines and is forced to rent them out at deep discounts, all while maintaining upkeep of the system. And hurtful, because SBC lost 3.2 million consumer lines in 2002 due to increased competition---competition that could only exist because SBC is forced to rent out its lines. Advocates of the federal government's Telecommunications Act of 1996 claim the deregulation is a necessary step in ensuring a fair, competitive, consumer-driven communications marketplace and point to statistics that show consumers are now being offered a wider variety of better calling plan options than before. --- Christian Heinze

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