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

DATE: FRIDAY, August 26, 1994                   TAG: 9408260065
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: A5   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: WASHINGTON                                 LENGTH: Medium

JUDGE CLEARS MCCAW BUYOUT

AT&T Corp. won court approval Thursday for its $12.6 billion plan to buy McCaw Cellular Communications, the nation's largest cellular phone company.

U.S. District Judge Harold Greene gave AT&T a partial waiver from his landmark order 10 years ago that broke up the telephone giant. The waiver allows AT&T to acquire cellular properties that McCaw co-owns with regional Bell telephone companies, including the lucrative Houston and Los Angeles markets.

BellSouth, which opposed the waiver request, will appeal the decision, said general counsel Walter Alford.

``This order gives AT&T and McCaw a clear advantage in the marketplace because they can proceed to combine cellular and long-distance operations while BellSouth and other regional Bell companies are saddled with unfair restrictions,'' the company said in a statement.

``Today's ruling is good news for consumers and business customers as well as for competition in the cellular industry,'' said AT&T spokesman Jim McGann. The company hopes to complete the merger by Sept. 30.

The order says that if a proposed antitrust settlement between AT&T and the Department of Justice is not approved by the court, AT&T must divest its interests in the cellular systems co-owned with the Bell companies. Telecommunications attorneys called this stipulation routine.

In granting approval, Greene imposed conditions on AT&T and McCaw designed to protect competition. AT&T said it had recommended these conditions.

The order says neither AT&T nor its affiliates can unfairly steer McCaw's 3.2 million cellular customers toward AT&T for their long-distance calls, which would harm competing long-distance companies.

And, given that AT&T is a major supplier of cellular equipment, the order bars the company from being the ``beneficiary of any discrimination'' involving the procurement of telecommunications equipment and technical services from its cellular systems.

Greene said the objective of the consent decree was to take away from regional Bell companies the incentive to discriminate in favor of AT&T.

by CNB