
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, September 3, 1993                   TAG: 9309030143
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A-11   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MAG POFF STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

BELL ATLANTIC GIVES C&P A NEW NAME

Chesapeake & Potomac Telephone Co. of Virginia's name will disappear next year. Its parent company, Bell Atlantic Corp., said Thursday it will use its own name to identify all of its subsidiaries, products and services.

Under the plan, C&P Telephone, which operates phone systems in Virginia, will become Bell Atlantic-Virginia in 1994.

Philadelphia-based Bell Atlantic, which has telephone subsidiaries in six states and the District of Columbia, said it is making the change to help customers understand the range of the company and its services.

Bell Atlantic President James G. Cullen said the company is reorganizing along market segments through core lines of business to streamline the way it serves customers.

The move follows Bell Atlantic's successful federal court challenge in Virginia last week that overturned the law that prohibited phone companies from fully participating in interactive multimedia television.

The ruling opens the way for Bell Atlantic to provide new products and services in information and entertainment.

Bell Atlantic's local service phone companies are Chesapeake & Potomac Telephone of Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland and Washington; New Jersey Bell; Bell of Pennsylvania; and Diamond State Telephone of Delaware.

Bell Atlantic's product line ranges from basic voice telephone service to high-speed packet-switched digital data services for large business applications. It includes a growing line of call-handling features and an emerging line of one-way and interactive video services.

The company's Bell Atlantic Video Services subsidiary expects one day to offer a line of fully interactive broad-band video services such as video on demand, shopping and banking from home and "telemedicine" remote diagnostics.

Bell Atlantic also is the parent of one of the nation's largest cellular carriers and of companies that provide software, systems integration, hardware and software support and financial services throughout the United States and internationally.

In addition, Bell Atlantic International offers network services and consulting to telephone authorities throughout the world. It owns an interest in Telecom Corp. of New Zealand.

by CNB