The New York Times > Business > AT&T Looks Beyond 'Number, Please'

The New York Times > Business > AT&T Looks Beyond 'Number, Please': "For a century, AT&T was known as America's premier phone company. If Hossein Eslambolchi has his way, that label will go the way of the dodo bird.
As chief technology and chief information officer, Mr. Eslambolchi is the technological strategist behind AT&T's ambitious turnaround plan to become a data transmission company selling an array of software products like network security systems - with phone calls being just one of many digital services.
Indeed, for the first time, voice calls generated less than half of the revenue in AT&T's corporate business group in 2004.
A few years ago, this approach was heresy at AT&T, where connecting calls was the cornerstone of the former monopoly's business. But with falling prices, growing competition and cheap new Internet phone services from start-up companies, AT&T's future depends more than ever on vigorous cost-cutting and focusing on its worldwide data network."