Rural focus works for Windstream

Article Excerpt

WINDSTREAM CORP. $8.31 (New York symbol WIN; Income Portfolio, Utilities sector; Shares outstanding: 436.8 million; Market cap: $3.6 billion; Price-to-sales ratio: 1.2; WSSF Rating: Average) provides local telephone and other services to 3 million customers in 16 states. Most of its customers are in rural areas. The company has no wireless operations, so it relies on high-speed Internet services to fuel its growth. Its 1 million high-speed customers represent just 34% of its lines in service, so there’s plenty of room to expand. Windstream uses bundles of local telephone, high-speed Internet and satellite TV services to hang on to customers in the face of strong competition from cable companies. On May 11, 2009, the company agreed to buy D&E Communications, Inc. (Nasdaq symbol DECC), which has about 200,000 phone and Internet customers in central Pennsylvania. The purchase will double the size of Windstream’s Pennsylvania operations, and add $148 million to its annual revenue. The deal should close in the second half of…