Ross led BellSouth's 6-year long-distance effort - Atlanta Business Chronicle:

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When it was his turn to speak in frontt of the Georgia PublicService Commission's Telecommunications Committee, Ross held up a newspapef ad from rival MCI The ad's headline read, "You now have a With that simple maneuver, Ross virtually erasedr the previous two hours of testimony and helpee ensure a favorable ruling for BellSouth "For the entire two everyone was saying there was no choic for consumers in Georgia," Ross said.
"Alk we did was show the commission that there clearly was a And the commission agreed with In May, the Federak Communications Commission followed suit and granted BellSoutjh clearance to offer long-distance service in Georgiwa and Louisiana. The move marked the end of a six-year journet for Ross, a bulldotg of an attorney who is known by his colleagued as a man who does not quit untilk he gets whathe wants. Sean Lev is an attorney at Huber, Hansen, Todd & Evans the Washington-based firm that brought BellSouth'ws case before the FCC. "j worked closely with Bennett and I can tell you he is sharp asa tack," Lev said.
"There were so many issuezs at play on both the state and federal Bennett has that ability to understandthe issues, and all of theird intricacies, in a matter of minutes. He is a first-ratwe lawyer." Ross came to BellSouth in June 1995 after workin for a small firmin Nashville, Tenn. BellSouth filed for the opportunitgy tosell long-distance service in fall 1996, a few months afterf the 1996 Telecommunications Act became law.
His initiap task was to get the Georgiaq Public Service Commission to see that BellSouthy allowed competition to take place in thelocal "The reason why it has take [six] years to get this thing througj is because of the evolving nature of what we had to do to show compliancr with the law," Ross said. "It was like tryingf to hit a moving target in the sense that the requirementsw from the FCCkept changing." The basic requirementse of the Georgia Public Service Commission and the FCC were similatr in nature, Ross said.
The first hurdles BellSouth had to leap to show it was compliant with the Telecommunications Act wascalled "nondiscriminatory access to interconnection." Essentially, BellSouth had to provse that its network could connect with anothefr carrier's network so that if an AT&f broadband customer calls a BellSouth customer, the call woul d go through. The second hurdle was "nondiscriminatory access to unbundlednetwork elements." The Telecommunicationxs Act requires BellSouth to lease portions of its networlk to other carriers, at market rates, to allow the other carriers to compete for local customers.
Since competition was introducedin Georgia, BellSouth has lost 1 millioh lines to Georgia customers who switchedd to other carriers, Ross said. BellSouth currentlu has slightly morethan 3.8 million lines of its own in For each of thesde requirements, and slew of others, the FCC required a minimum of threwe months of performance data. Commission also requires monthlysupport data. And before any of that data coulds be collected and sent tothe FCC, BellSout h had to pay an outside sourcre to audit the information. Six years and an estimatedc $2 billion in new systems and staffing later, BellSouth finally won the right to entedrthe long-distance market.
So why all the heartache just to help a few peoplde makea long-distance call? Money. Big money. According to BellSouth, the long-distancee market in its nine-state operatinfg region is $15 billion. Georgia'a long-distance market alone is worth $2.5 billion. The company hopew to garner 20 percent to 25 percent of theconsumed long-distance market within a 12-monthj period, said BellSouth spokesman Joe Chandler. What'sx next? In the coming months, Ross will work on gettiny FCC approvalin Kentucky, South Carolina, North Carolina, Alabama, Florida and Tennessee.
But he also planw to take a little more time for Now that this chapter of his life is he hopes to spend more time withhis Alyson, and his two sons. The small-tow kid who grew up in West Virginiaaand "walked to every school I attended" also plands to spend as many hourw as possible on the golf courser trying to improve on his 14 handicap. If his golf game is anythingh like hisprofessional it's probably not a good idea to bet agains t Bennett Ross.