Windstream to acquire NuVox
Bye bye happy NuVox/NewSouth circle thing!
Sara and I have been extremely busy this week so I’ll have to ask you to cut us some slack for being a few days late with this news.
Wednesday November 3rd NuVox, Inc. entered into an agreement to be acquired by the Windstream Corporation (NYSE: WIN).
The purchase has been valued at over $643 million dollars. Windstream expects to issue 18.7 million fixed shares of stock valued at $183 million dollars, pay $280 million dollars, and assume a net debt of $180 million dollars as part of the proposed transaction.
You can read the official statements on press releases at BusinessWire or on the Windstream or NuVox websites. For my unofficial, not in anyway representative of my employer statement, keep reading.
I have worked for NuVox since July of 2001 and Sara was hired on in April of 2002 to prepare for the One.NET acquisition. My initial thought, being a veteran of a large number of mergers and acquisitions at NuVox was, “We’ll see what happens.” After reading some more about Windstream I have to say I am very excited about the prospects for the combined company. I assume Windstream hopes to deploy NuVox’s products across it’s footprint and vice versa although I haven’t heard anything to definitively confirm or deny this. If this is the case I am interested to see how NuVox’s product set would be deployed on Windstream’s network and vice versa not to mention the possibility for new products we could deploy on both networks. I could definitely see the benefit in developing an IPTV product that could compete with AT&T’s U-Verse and Verizon’s FIOS offerings.
In my time at NuVox (I started just after the Trivergent and Gabriel Communications merger) the company, our network, and our products and services have grown tremendously. I’ve gotten to play a part in the convergence of our network (MPLS roll out, Sonus VoIP deployment, QoS and Multicast roll out, etc.) development of some of our coolest products and services (VoxIP, VoIP product, and VoxNET, MPLS VPN product with optional QoS and Multicast) , and helped integrate multiple networks into the NuVox network as a part of our various mergers and acquisitions. (See the timeline below…) With the amount of the time and effort I’ve invested in the last eight and a half years I’ll admit that it’s been hard not to get attached. I work with a great group of people that have worked some miracles over the years to build NuVox’s network.
At any rate, here’s a time line I’ve put together to try to document all of the mergers and acquisitions over the course of NuVox’s history. I am missing some exact dates so if I got something wrong or missed something feel free to comment and I’ll update it. It was hard enough to track down dates (much less precise dates) for all of the constituent parts of NuVox so I’ll let someone else who is more inclined do the Windstream piece. I think NuVox’s M&A history is a drop in the bucket compared to their’s.
1995:
Sometime in 1995 – Carolina Online, Inc. is founded to provide internet access to the businesses and residents of South Carolina.
1996:
January 1996 – Nicky Smith starts the Internet/MCR Corporation to provide internet access to the businesses and residents of North Carolina.
February 1996 - ISAAC.net is founded to provide internet access to the businesses and residents of Wilmington, NC.
1997:
Sometime in 1997 – NewSouth Communications is founded to service business customers in the Southeast.
1998:
Sometime in 1998 – Florida Digital Network is founded to service businesses and residents in Florida.
November 1998 – Bob Brooks of Brooks Fiber and Cencom Cable Associates (Charter) fame founds Gabriel Communications to service business customers in the Midwest.
1999:
Sometime in 1999 – The Houser family founds State Communications to service businesses and residents in the Southeast.
April 1999 – State Communications acquires Carolina Online, Inc. and becomes Trivergent. Trivergent continues to provide residential and business internet and phone service to customers in the Southeast.
2000:
February 2000 – Trivergent acquires ISAAC.net and Teleco of Wilmington.
March 2000 – Gabriel Communications and Solutech launch WebBizApps, LLC venture to provide an array of web based business applications.
April 2000 – NewSouth Communications and UniversalCom, Inc. announce intent to merge.
June 2000 – Trivergent and Gabriel Communications announce intent to merge.
July 2000 – Trivergent acquires Internet/MCR Corporation.
NewSouth Communications and UniversalCom, Inc. merger closes. The new company will continue to operate as NewSouth Communications.
November 2000 – Trivergent and Gabriel Communications merger closes.
2001:
February 2001 – NuVox Communications is chosen for the name of the new company created through the merger of Trivergent and Gabriel Communications.
May 2001 – NuVox acquires the remaining 50% of WebBizApps, LLC from Solutech.
2002:
February 2002 – NuVox acquires One.Net from US.net.
April 2002 – LecStar purchases the resale residential phone service customers left from the State Communications days from NuVox.
NuVox acquires Edge Connections, Inc.
2003:
March 2003 – FDN acquires the Florida assets of MPower Communications.
2004:
February 2004 – NuVox and NewSouth Communications announce intent to merge.
May 2004 – NuVox and NewSouth Communications merger closes. The new company will continue to operate as NuVox.
2005:
March 2005 – FDN and HIG Capital jointly acquire Supra Telecom.
2007:
March 2007 – NuVox and FDN announce intent to merge.
June 2007 – NuVox and FDN merger closes. The new company will continue to operate as NuVox.
2009:
November 2009 – Windstream to acquire NuVox.
