I’ve just come back from attending the AT&T stockholder meeting in San Antonio. There’s lots to tell and share, and in the interest of time and in the interest of getting at least one post up on my blog, I am going to do two posts- one today and another one early next week.
Before I begin, just a caveat- if you are looking for insight on earnings per share, news on when the 3G iPhone will ship, and new technologies coming out of AT&T labs, you’ve come to the wrong place.
This post is a quick summary of some of AT&T’s Chairman and CEO Randall Stephenson’s comments in his State of the Company. Next week, I will post on my observations of what I observed to be more of a town hall meeting, as opposed to this event being a traditional stockholder’s meeting.
And so the meeting came to order…
The meeting comprised of introductions, stockholder proposals, a presentation by the Chairman & CEO and an open microphone session for attendees.
First order of business was to define and articulate what AT&T was all about. Last year, the company’s mantra was about being a communications and entertainment services company. This year, with Randall at the helm, there was a subtle, but important shift in the message: he wants AT&T to connect people with their world, where they live and work, and do it better than anyone else.
He proudly stated that AT&T was:
- Numero Uno in Wireless
- Numero Uno in Broadband
- Numbero Uno in Residential
- Numbero Uno in being the first in the U.S. to lead in TV over IP (IPTV)
- Numbero Uno in Yellow Pages
He stated that he was ramping up on $20 Billion in future investments in four key areas:
1. Mobility – he emphasized the growth of the wireless side of the house. And with the melding of Cingular/BellSouth into the company, it’s full steam ahead.
2. Consumer and Business Broadband - he highlighted the fact that consumer broadband traffic was up 140% in the past two years and the recent launch of its alliance with Cisco in deploying its TelePresence solution was now under way.
3. AT&T’s “footprint.” Randall talked about AT&T’s “footprint” citing the example of the deal they just announced with Starbucks. By the company’s footprint, he described making WiFi available in more places (like Starbucks) and the transition to GSM so you can have global cellular coverage. Case in point: in March I was in Israel. I walk off the plane, and CellCom, AT&T’s partner in Israel picks me up and can hand off calls to me 1/3 of the world away.
There was one element of AT&T’s footprint strategy that Randall left out: it’s footprint on the retail landscape of America with its AT&T stores and its newer flavor of AT&T Experience stores.
With all its money, technology smarts, and way cool iPhones, I have always contended that AT&T’s retail presence is a key competitive advantage that only Verizon can match up with. Retail draws traffic. It educates customers and cross-sells new services. That’s something the cable companies aren’t doing.
4. IP Networking. Randall talked about the vision to deploy IP over three screens (hence the name of this blog) and how the core of its IP residential play, U-verse is now reaching close to 400,000 American homes like mine. In May of this year, I will be starting my third year as a U-verse customer and look forward to continued upgrades with new services such as Whole Home DVR.
After his state of the company, the microphone was opened up to the audience. I will get into some of the questions and issues addressed in my post next week.
Finally, a nice finishing touch to the meeting- a free $5.00 gift card from Starbucks; thanks Randall.
What Randall did not talk about…
Maybe it was matter of time, or the fact that as a publicly held company, you can’t go around publicly touting what’s coming down the pipeline, but here are a few of my own takes on what I think will matter for the balance of 2008.
- The 3G iPhone (expected sometime this summer) will not only be popular with consumers, but will begin adoption (limited) by corporate America because of its support for enterprise class applications.
- Whole Home DVR on U-verse will illustrate yet another feature of managing video over IP, and the growing importance of having the equivalent of a small enterprise network in your home.
- A few more global acquisitions. I don’t know what they are or what they will be, but AT&T is not just an American phone company. Look for its presence and brand to grow worldwide.
- It’s alliance with Cisco and the deployment of its TelePresence solution will help AT&T in disrupting some of its competitors.
- San Antonio will continue to be a Petri dish for testing new types of telecommunications technologies in AT&T’s own back yard. More on that to come.
And more to come....stay tuned.
Photo of AT&T Chairman, Randall Stephenson and me at this morning's annual stockholder meeting, courtesy of AT&T.
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