Questions and Answers with Bryan Gonterman

Published: August 22, 2008

Q: I understand that you worked for AT&T in Texas before taking this post. What were your previous roles with the company?

A: I'm transitioning here to Oklahoma City from San Antonio, where I was with the company for 10 short months. I'm a native of St. Louis, both my wife and I are from there; our families are still there. I've spent the last 11 years working in Texas in multiple locations working originally for SBC and now AT&T, locations in Dallas, then Austin and various organizations within marketing, regulatory, legislative and operations within the company.

Q: The wireline telephone business is in decline while wireless and broadband business is growing. What's the biggest challenge facing AT&T today?

A: I don't know if it's a challenge. I think I see it as more of an opportunity, and that is changing the business that we are in. We are very quickly migrating from a traditional landline voice company to a mobile, broadband and video company. The way that people are communicating and their buying habits today are dictating that we have to (implement) that change. We've lost about 5

million landline voice customers over the past year but we are growing dramatically on the wireless side; growing a little over 9 million wireless subscribers. We are on par to have over 1 million U-verse customers, which is our new video product. That is a change not only from our customers' perspective, making sure they recognize that AT&T is a mobile, broadband and video company, but also a cultural change within the inside of the company. We've been very focused on doing that because it's exactly what customers are demanding.

Q: The Communications Workers of America recently released a survey showing that Oklahoma ranks near the bottom of broadband speeds; what can AT&T do to expand both broadband speeds and access?

A: We are and in multiple ways. AT&T provides a broadband solution to 100 percent of our consumers. We are using multiple technologies to do that, both DSL, mobile technologies such as the 3G wireless card as well as joint marketing arrangements like Wild Blue that provide a satellite solution. Broadband availability is something that we feel is very important, and accessibility is very important to ensure continued economic development through all parts of the state, not just the most densely populated areas. One of the things we have been advocating is some changes in the Universal Service Fund structure.

Q: So how would the Universal Service Fund changes work to support broadband?

A: Today, the Universal Service Fund is going to support or offset some of the historic costs to provide voice telephone service. We believe there needs to be a shift or transition away from that legacy structure into one that is supporting broadband alternatives. Once you have a broadband connection established, providing voice service is an application over that and it opens up the world to access not only to the Internet but also to data applications and potentially video alternatives, as well.

Business Writer Jim Stafford

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