Warwick Valley Telephone changes NYSE listing, realigns corporate structure

Warwick Valley Telephone Company, which is now referred to as WVT Communications Group (NYSE MKT: WVT), on Tuesday completed the transfer of its stock listing from the Nasdaq Global Market to the NYSE Euronext's MKT.

The service provider's stock transfer is just one of two major transitions it's undergoing. WVT also announced its restructuring into an unregulated holding company.

Through this corporate restructuring process, WVT transferred all of its regulated local telephone business to a new wholly-owned subsidiary. This means that all of the company's business units are subsidiaries of the company, with the ILEC operations still subject to New York and New Jersey Public Service Commission (PSC) and related telecom regulations.

Duane W. Albro, WVT Communication Group's CEO, said in a release announcing the change that the new structure gives the service provider more freedom to spend money on expanding its growing base of cloud and unified communications services via its Alteva and USA Datanet subsidiaries.  

"With the new corporate organization now in place, we may now proceed with the complete rebranding of the company, which is already positioned as a fast growing, ninth largest cloud-based unified communications ("UC") services provider in the United States," he said.

Albro added that when it gets shareholder approval, the name of the holding company will be changed to WVT Communications Group.

What helped paved the way for WVT to make this change were regulatory decisions made by both the New York State Public Service Commission and the New Jersey Public Service Commission allowing it to transfer its regulated ILEC assets into a newly formed, wholly-owned subsidiary of the WVT Communications Group holding company called Warwick Valley Telephone. WVT's cloud-based UC businesses, Alteva and USA Datanet, will continue to operate as wholly-owned subsidiaries.

Becoming a larger player in the UC and cloud services market is important for the ILEC, which for all of its 100-year life was just another regulated independent ILEC, providing mainly voice and, over time, broadband and TV services. But similar to the transition that CenturyLink (NYSE: CTL) and Windstream (Nasdaq: WIN) have gone through in recent years, WVT realized that its real future growth lies in its ability to be a bigger player in the diverse business market segment.

For more:
- here's the trading release
- and the restructuring release

Special report: Wireline telecom earnings in the third quarter

Related articles:
WVT Communications rises 19% to $6.9M on strong cloud, UC sales
WVT's Alteva enhances UC offerings with Mozy's Data Backup service
USA Datanet targets UC opportunities with channel partner program
Warwick Valley Telephone's Alteva acquisition keeps the ILEC from becoming a PSTN footnote
Warwick Valley Telephone bolsters cloud, CLEC vision with $17M Alteva acquisition