| The Southern New England Telephone Company | |
| Trade Name: | Frontier Communications of Connecticut |
| Type: | Subsidiary |
| Location: | New Haven, Connecticut |
| Industry: | Telecommunications |
| Num Employees: | 2700 |
| Products: | Local Telephone Service, Broadband |
| Parent: | SNET (1986–1998) SBC/AT&T Inc. (1998–2014) Frontier (2014–present; Sale to Verizon pending) |
| Homepage: | http://www.frontier.com/ |
The Southern New England Telephone Company (SNET), doing business as Frontier Communications of Connecticut, is a local exchange carrier owned by Frontier Communications.
It started operations on January 28, 1878, as the District Telephone Company of New Haven.[1] It was the founder of the first telephone exchange, as well as the world's first telephone book. Since its inception, SNET has held a monopoly on most of the telephone services in the state of Connecticut; the only remaining exceptions are the Greenwich and Byram exchanges where Verizon New York provides telephone service.[2]
SNET and Cincinnati Bell were the only two companies in the old Bell System in which the old AT&T only held a minority stake; by 1983, AT&T's stake was only 19.6 percent. Therefore, both were considered independents rather than Bell Operating Companies.
SNET was purchased for $4.4 billion in 1998 by SBC Communications, which subsequently purchased the old AT&T, taking its name as the "new" AT&T. Under AT&T, SNET was known as AT&T Connecticut.
In 2006, AT&T merged the operations of SNET into AT&T Teleholdings, formerly Ameritech, making it a subsidiary of the latter.
On June 1, 2007, the operations of Woodbury Telephone were merged into SNET.
On October 24, 2014, Frontier Communications completed its purchase of AT&T's Connecticut operations, including Southern New England Telephone and SNET America, for $2 billion.[3] The company began doing business as Frontier Communications of Connecticut. It is the second former unit of the Bell System to be acquired by Frontier, the first being Frontier West Virginia (originally C&P Telephone of West Virginia) which was purchased from Verizon in 2010.
On September 5, 2024, Verizon announced that it will buy Frontier Communications for $20 billion. The acquisition, if approved, will see Verizon taking control of Frontier’s operations, including SNET.[4]