Post: CenturyTel shareholders will benefit from Embarq deal

Glen Post, chairman and CEO of CenturyTel, stressed shareholder value in discussing his company’s $5.8 billion acquisition of Embarq, but Wall Street’s initial reaction was negative, as CenturyTel’s stock slid more than $3 a share.

“We know it’s the greatest investment for our company and our shareholders,” Post said. “We paid a fair price for Embarq, and I’m confident this will drive shareholder value over time.”

Post told analysts the deal would be “accretive to free cash flow on an as-realized basis” in the first full year after the closing and highlighted several immediate changes that would be made to the way Embarq operates, which he believes will produce positive results.

“This will be a company of impressive scale, but it’s not just about getting bigger, it’s about increasing shareholder value,” Post said, who will be CEO of the new firm but will surrender his chairman title to Bill Owens, the non-executive chairman of the Embarq board. “This will be share accretive in the first full year. We expect to see $400 million in annual run rate synergies. This will be a larger, financially stronger company well positioned to significantly increase shareholder value.”

Among the improvements, Post cited “a little different approach to marketing, as we will focus more on direct mail than mass media, which has been Embarq’s approach.”

Embarq systems will be quickly merged onto CenturyTel back-office systems, which have the flexibility to implement fast and targeted pricing changes to enable the telco to more effectively compete with cable offerings, Post said. “We can compete effectively, especially since they have already taken initial surge of the cable competition,” he added.

Post also outlined a facilities-based wireless strategy for the new company, which builds on the 700 MHz spectrum CenturyTel acquired in the recent auction and looks to “trade spectrum or carve out spectrum that other carriers have today that they might not want to build out in our markets” in order to cover the Embarq footprint. The goal is to offer a broadband wireless data service, not a voice offering, Post said, but CenturyTel will carefully evaluate the cost of any spectrum acquisition. “If it costs too much, we won’t do it,” Post said.