The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission on Nov. 6 approved Windstream Corp.’s acquisition D&E Communications. In a unanimous 4-0 vote, the PUC commissioners concluded that the merger will benefit telecom customers in Pennsylvania in several ways, including the fact that average rate caps that will benefit customers of the D&E businesses and Windstream’s regulated operations in the state.
Although the D&E businesses’ names may change as they will be subsidiaries of Windstream, no transfer of assets or facilities in Pennsylvania will take place as a result of the acquisition.
Customers of the D&E businesses will continue to receive services from the same local providers under the same terms and conditions as prior to the transaction, and the D&E businesses will “not protest a qualified request for a certificate of public convenience or challenge a qualified applicant’s right to interconnect merely on the basis that an applicant plans to provide wholesale services,” the PUC noted.
Unfortunately for D&E employees, layoffs are expected. According to Lancaster Online, hundreds of D&E employees will be laid off as a result of the transaction.
Windstream, like its other tier 2 telco brethren, is in somewhat of an acquisition spree. They just recently announced the acquisition of NuVox. They also agreed to buy Lexcom earlier this year.
