The Bell System was a system of

telecommunication Telecommunication is the transmission of information by various types of technologies over wire, radio, optical, or other electromagnetic systems. It has its origin in the desire of humans for communication over a distance greater than that ...

companies, led by the

Bell Telephone Company The Bell Telephone Company, a common law joint stock company, was organized in Boston, Massachusetts, on July 9, 1877, by Alexander Graham Bell's father-in-law Gardiner Greene Hubbard, who also helped organize a sister company – the New Engl ...

and later by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over one hundred years from its creation in 1877 until its antitrust breakup in 1983. The system of companies was often colloquially called Ma Bell (as in "Mother Bell"), as it held a vertical monopoly over telecommunication products and services in most areas of the United States and Canada. At the time of the

breakup of the Bell System The breakup of the Bell System was mandated on January 8, 1982, by an agreed consent decree providing that AT&T Corporation would, as had been initially proposed by AT&T, relinquish control of the Bell Operating Companies, which had provided lo ...

in the early 1980s, it had assets of $150 billion (equivalent to $ billion in ) and employed over one million people. Ever since the 1910s, American antitrust regulators had been observing and accusing the Bell System of abusing its monopoly power, and had brought legal action multiple times over the decades, until in 1974 the

Antitrust Division The United States Department of Justice Antitrust Division is a division of the U.S. Department of Justice that enforces U.S. antitrust law. It has exclusive jurisdiction over U.S. federal criminal antitrust prosecutions. It also has jurisdict ...

of the U.S. Department of Justice brought a lawsuit against Bell claiming violations of the Sherman Act. In 1982, anticipating that it could not win, AT&T agreed to a Justice Department-mandated consent decree that settled the lawsuit and ordered it to break itself up into seven " Regional Bell Operating Companies" (known as "The Baby Bells"). This ended the existence of the conglomerate in 1984. These Baby Bells became independent companies and several of them are today very large corporations in their own right.

History

In 1877, the American Bell Telephone Company, named after

Alexander Graham Bell Alexander Graham Bell (, born Alexander Bell; March 3, 1847 – August 2, 1922) was a Scottish-born inventor, scientist and engineer who is credited with patenting the first practical telephone. He also co-founded the American Telephone and T ...

, opened the first telephone exchange in

New Haven, Connecticut New Haven is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound in New Haven County, Connecticut and is part of the New York City metropolitan area. With a population of 134 ...

. Within a few years

local exchange telephone exchange, telephone switch, or central office is a telecommunications system used in the public switched telephone network (PSTN) or in large enterprises. It interconnects telephone subscriber lines or virtual circuits of digital syste ...

companies were established in every major city in the United States. Use of the ''Bell System'' name initially referred to those early telephone franchises and eventually comprised all telephone companies owned by American Telephone & Telegraph, referred to internally as ''associated companies'', ''regional holding companies'', or later ''Bell operating companies'' (BOCs). In 1899, American Telephone & Telegraph (AT&T) acquired the assets of its parent, the American Bell Telephone Company. American Bell had created AT&T to provide long-distance calls between New York and Chicago and beyond. AT&T became the parent of American Bell Telephone Company, and thus the head of the Bell System, because regulatory and tax rules were leaner in New York than in Boston, where American Bell was headquartered. Later, the Bell System and its moniker "Ma Bell" became a term that referred generally to all AT&T companies, of which there were five major divisions: * AT&T Long Lines, providing long lines to interconnect local exchanges and long-distance calling services, and international lines including submarine cables *

Western Electric Company The Western Electric Company was an American electrical engineering and manufacturing company officially founded in 1869. A wholly owned subsidiary of American Telephone & Telegraph for most of its lifespan, it served as the primary equipment ...

, Bell's equipment manufacturing arm *

Bell Labs Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984), then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996) and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007), is an American industrial research and scientific development company owned by mul ...

, conducting research and development for

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile ...

and Western Electric; ownership initially equally split between Western and AT&T *

Bell operating companies The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over one hundre ...

, providing local exchange telephone services *

, the American Telephone and Telegraph company, who led the combined enterprise in planning and finance. In 1913, the federal government challenged the Bell System's growing

monopoly A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek el, μόνος, mónos, single, alone, label=none and el, πωλεῖν, pōleîn, to sell, label=none), as described by Irving Fisher, is a market with the "absence of competition", creating a situati ...

over the phone system under AT&T ownership in an anti-trust suit, leading to the Kingsbury Commitment. Under the commitment, AT&T escaped break-up or nationalization in exchange for divesting itself of

Western Union The Western Union Company is an American multinational financial services company, headquartered in Denver, Colorado. Founded in 1851 as the New York and Mississippi Valley Printing Telegraph Company in Rochester, New York, the company cha ...

and allowing non-competing independent telephone companies to interconnect with its long-distance network. After 1934, the

Federal Communications Commission The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdicti ...

(FCC) assumed regulation of AT&T. Proliferation of telephone service allowed the company to become the largest corporation in the world until its dismantling by the United States Department of Justice in 1984, at which time the Bell System ceased to exist.

Formation under Bell patent

1912 Bell System advertisement promoting its slogan for universal service Receiving a U.S.

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

for the invention of the

telephone A telephone is a telecommunications device that permits two or more users to conduct a conversation when they are too far apart to be easily heard directly. A telephone converts sound, typically and most efficiently the human voice, into e ...

on March 7, 1876, Alexander Graham Bell formed the Bell Telephone Company in 1877, which in 1885 became AT&T. When Bell's original patent expired 15 years later in 1894, the telephone market opened to competition and 6,000 new telephone companies started while the Bell Telephone company took a significant financial downturn. On April 30, 1907, Theodore Newton Vail returned as President of AT&T. Vail believed in the superiority of one national telephone system and AT&T adopted the slogan ''One Policy, One System, Universal Service.'' This became the company's philosophy for the next 70 years. Under Vail, AT&T began acquiring many of the smaller telephone companies including Western Union telegraph.

Kingsbury Commitment

Anxious to avoid action from government antitrust suits, in 1913 AT&T entered into an out-of-court agreement known as the Kingsbury Commitment with the federal government. AT&T committed to sell its $30 million in Western Union capital stock, allow competitors to interconnect with its system, and not acquire other independent companies without permission from the

Interstate Commerce Commission The Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was a regulatory agency in the United States created by the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The agency's original purpose was to regulate railroads (and later trucking) to ensure fair rates, to elimina ...

Nationwide monopoly

The Bell trademark pictured here was used from 1921 through 1969 by both the AT&T corporation and the regional operating corporations to co-brand themselves under a single Bell System trademark. For each regional operating company, its name was placed where "name of associated company" appears in this template version of the trademark. Bell system telephones and related equipment were made by Western Electric, a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T Co. Member telephone companies paid a fixed fraction of their revenues as a license fee to

. As a result of this vertical monopoly, the Bell System effectively owned most telephone service in the United States by 1940, from local and long-distance service to the telephones. This allowed Bell to prohibit its customers from connecting equipment not made or sold by Bell to the system without paying fees. For example, if a customer desired a style of telephone not leased by the local Bell company, the customer was required to purchase the instrument at cost, furnish it to the telephone company for rewiring, pay a service charge, and a monthly lease fee for using it. In 1949, the United States Department of Justice alleged in an antitrust lawsuit that AT&T and the Bell System operating companies were using their near-monopoly in telecommunications to attempt to establish unfair advantage in related technologies. The outcome was a 1956 consent decree limiting AT&T to 85% of the United States' national telephone network and certain government contracts, and from continuing to hold interests in

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by to ...

and the

Caribbean The Caribbean (, ) ( es, El Caribe; french: la Caraïbe; ht, Karayib; nl, De Caraïben) is a region of the Americas that consists of the Caribbean Sea, its islands (some surrounded by the Caribbean Sea and some bordering both the Caribbean ...

. The Bell System's Canadian operations included the

Bell Canada Bell Canada (commonly referred to as Bell) is a Canadian telecommunications company headquartered at 1 Carrefour Alexander-Graham-Bell in the borough of Verdun in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is an ILEC (incumbent local exchange carrier) in ...

regional operating company and the

Northern Electric Northern Electric was an electricity supply and distribution company serving north east England. History It had its origins as the North Eastern Electricity Board, formed as part of the nationalisation of the electricity industry by the Elec ...

manufacturing subsidiary of the Bell System's Western Electric equipment manufacturer. Western Electric divested Northern Electric in 1956, but AT&T did not divest itself of Bell Canada until 1975.

ITT Inc. ITT Inc., formerly ITT Corporation, is an American worldwide manufacturing company based in Stamford, Connecticut. The company produces specialty components for the aerospace, transportation, energy and industrial markets. ITT's three business ...

, then known as ''International Telephone & Telegraph Co.'', purchased the Bell System's Caribbean regional operating companies. The consent decree also forced Bell to make all of its patents royalty-free. This led to substantial increases in innovation, in particular in the electronics and computer sectors. Steven Weber's ''The Success of Open Source'' characterizes the consent decree as important in fostering the open source movement. The Bell System also owned various Caribbean regional operating companies, as well as 54% of Japan's

NEC is a Japanese multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. The company was known as the Nippon Electric Company, Limited, before rebranding in 1983 as NEC. It provides IT and network soluti ...

and a post-

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

reconstruction relationship with

state-owned State ownership, also called government ownership and public ownership, is the ownership of an industry, asset, or enterprise by the state or a public body representing a community, as opposed to an individual or private party. Public owne ...

Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) before the 1956 boundaries were emplaced. Before 1956, the Bell System's reach was truly gargantuan. Even during the period from 1956 to 1984, the Bell System's dominant reach into all forms of communications was pervasive within the United States and influential in telecommunication standardization throughout the industrialized world. The 1984 Bell System divestiture brought an end to the affiliation branded as the Bell System. It resulted from another antitrust lawsuit filed by the U.S. Department of Justice in 1974, alleging illegal practices by the Bell System companies to stifle

competition Competition is a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss (an example of which is a zero-sum game). Competition can arise between entities such as organisms, ind ...

in the telecommunications industry. The parties settled the lawsuit on January 8, 1982, superseding the former restrictions that AT&T and the DOJ had agreed upon in 1956.

Subsidiaries

Pre-1956 international holdings

Before the 1956 break-up, the Bell System included the companies listed below, plus those listed in the pre-1984 section. Northern Electric and the Caribbean regional operating companies were considered part of the Bell System proper before the break-up. Nippon Electric was considered a more distant affiliate of Western Electric, and through its own research and development adapted the designs of Western Electric's North American telecommunications equipment for use in Japan, which to this day gives much of Japan's telephone equipment and network a closer resemblance to North American ANSI and iconectiv standards than to European-originated

ITU-T The ITU Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) is one of the three sectors (divisions or units) of the International Telecommunication Union (ITU). It is responsible for coordinating standards for telecommunications and Information Co ...

standards. Before the 1956 break-up, Northern Electric was focused on manufacturing, without significant telecommunication-equipment research & development of its own. The operation of Japan's NTT during the post-World War II occupation was considered an administrative adjunct to the North American Bell System. * Nortel Networks Corporation, formerly Northern Telecom, an equipment-manufacturing company ** Northern Electric, a former telecommunications equipment-manufacturing subsidiary of Western Electric ** Dominion Electric, a former recording equipment-manufacturing company * Various former

regional operating companies, sold to

ITT ITT may refer to: Communication * Infantry-Tank Telephone, a device allowing infantrymen to speak to the occupants of armoured vehicles. Mathematics *Intuitionistic type theory, other name of Martin-Löf Type Theory *Intensional type theory B ...

, an equipment-manufacturing company in Japan ** Nippon Electric, a former telecommunications equipment-manufacturing company 54% owned by Western Electric * NTT, a telecommunications company in Japan that was administered by AT&T as part of General Douglas MacArthur's post-WWII reconstruction Bell Systems manhole hayward

Pre-1984 breakup

Immediately before the 1984 break-up, the Bell System had the following corporate structure: * American Telephone and Telegraph Company, a

holding company A holding company is a company whose primary business is holding a controlling interest in the securities of other companies. A holding company usually does not produce goods or services itself. Its purpose is to own shares of other companies ...

and long-distance carrier ** Illinois Bell Telephone Company **

Indiana Bell Indiana () is a U.S. state in the Midwestern United States. It is the 38th-largest by area and the 17th-most populous of the 50 States. Its capital and largest city is Indianapolis. Indiana was admitted to the United States as the 19th sta ...

Telephone Company, Incorporated ** Michigan Bell Telephone Company ** New England Telephone and Telegraph Company ** New Jersey Bell Telephone Company **

New York Telephone The New York Telephone Company (NYTel) was organized in 1896, taking over the New York City operations of the American Bell Telephone Company. Predecessor companies The Telephone Company of New York was formed under franchise in 1876. The princi ...

Company **

Northwestern Bell Northwestern Bell Telephone Company served the states of the upper Midwest opposite the Southwestern Bell area, including Iowa, Minnesota, South Dakota, North Dakota, and Nebraska. History Early beginnings It has never been definitively estab ...

Telephone Company **

Pacific Northwest Bell Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company was an AT&T majority-owned Bell System company that provided local telecommunications services in Oregon, Washington, and northern Idaho. Pacific Northwest Bell Telephone Company was formed on July 1, 196 ...

Telephone Company **

South Central Bell South Central Bell Telephone Company, headquartered in Birmingham, Alabama, was the name of the Bell System's operations in Alabama, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Tennessee. South Central Bell was created in July 1968 when the Bell tel ...

Telephone Company ** Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company ** Southwestern Bell Telephone Company ** The Bell Telephone Company of Pennsylvania ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company of Maryland ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company of West Virginia ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company of Virginia ** The Diamond State Telephone Company ** The Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company ** Malheur Home Telephone Company ** The Ohio Bell Telephone Company ** The Pacific Telephone and Telegraph Company ** Bell Telephone Company of Nevada ** Wisconsin Telephone Company *Other subsidiaries: **

(1880–1975) ***

(equipment manufacturing in Canada) (1914–1956) ** Western Electric Co., Inc. (equipment manufacturing) *** Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc. ( R&D (research & development), co-owned between

and Western Electric) ** Cincinnati Bell, Inc. (22.7% owned) ** The Southern New England Telephone Company (16.8% owned) **

Bellcomm Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984), then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996) and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007), is an American industrial research and scientific development company owned by mult ...

, Inc. (1963–1972; formed to support the Apollo program)

1984

On January 1, 1984, the former components of the Bell System were structured into the following Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs), which became known as Baby Bells. * American Information Technologies Corporation, branded as Ameritech ** Illinois Bell Telephone Company **

Telephone Company, Incorporated ** Michigan Bell Telephone Company **The Ohio Bell Telephone Company ** Wisconsin Bell, Inc. * American Telephone and Telegraph Company ** AT&T Communications, Inc. **

AT&T Information Systems AT&T Information Systems (ATTIS), originally known as American Bell, was the fully separate subsidiary of American Telephone & Telegraph Company (AT&T) which focused on computer technology ventures and telephone sales, and other unregulated busine ...

, Inc. **

AT&T Technologies AT&T Technologies, Inc., was created by AT&T in 1983 in preparation for the breakup of the Bell System, which became effective as of January 1, 1984. It assumed the corporate charter of Western Electric Co., Inc. History Creation AT&T (origi ...

, Inc. ** Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc. * Bell Atlantic Corporation ** New Jersey Bell Telephone Company ** The Bell Telephone Company of Pennsylvania ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company of Maryland ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company of West Virginia ** The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company of Virginia **The Diamond State Telephone Company *

Bell Communications Research iconectiv is a supplier of network planning and network management services to telecommunications providers. Known as Bellcore after its establishment in the United States in 1983 as part of the break-up of the Bell System, the company's name ...

, Inc., owned equally by all of the Baby Bells * BellSouth Corporation ** Southern Bell Telephone and Telegraph Company **

Telephone Company * Cincinnati Bell, Inc. **Cincinnati Bell Telephone Company *

NYNEX NYNEX Corporation was an American telephone company that served five states of New England ( Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island and Vermont) as well as most of the state of New York from January 1, 1984 to August 14, 1997. H ...

Corporation **

Company **

New England Telephone and Telegraph Company The New England Telephone and Telegraph Company was a very early, short lived company set up to develop the then-new telephone. It should not be confused with the New England Telephone and Telegraph Company that was formed a year later and was one ...

* Pacific Telesis Group ** Pacific Bell Telephone Company *** Nevada Bell Telephone Company * Southwestern Bell Corporation ** Southwestern Bell Telephone Company * The Southern New England Telephone Company *

U S WEST US West, Inc. (stylized as US WEST) was one of seven Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs, also referred to as "Baby Bells"), created in 1983 under the Modification of Final Judgement (''United States v. Western Electric Co., Inc.'' 552 ...

, Inc. **

Telephone Company **

Telephone Company **The Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company *** Malheur Home Telephone Company

Today

After 1984, multiple mergers occurred of the operating companies and between them, so that some components of the former Bell System are now owned by companies independent of the historic Bell System, including foreign telecommunications firms. The structure of the companies today is as follows. ;Remaining "Regional Bell Operating Companies" * AT&T Inc., a holding company ** AT&T Corp., a current subsidiary ** AT&T Teleholdings, Inc. (formerly Ameritech Corporation), a current subsidiary, also includes now defunct Pacific Telesis *** Illinois Bell Telephone Company, a regional LEC ***

Telephone Company, Incorporated, a currently existing regional LEC *** Michigan Bell Telephone Company, a regional LEC *** Pacific Bell Telephone Company, a regional LEC **** Nevada Bell Telephone Company, a regional LEC, omitted from the MFJ *** The Ohio Bell Telephone Company, a regional LEC *** Wisconsin Bell, Inc., a regional LEC ** BellSouth LLC, a current subsidiary. Its two operating companies merged into one: *** BellSouth Telecommunications, LLC, a regional LEC, includes Southern Bell & South Central Bell ** Southwestern Bell Telephone Company, a regional LEC * Verizon Communications, Inc., formerly Bell Atlantic Corporation, a holding company **

LLC, a former RBOC holding company *** Verizon New England, Inc., a regional LEC *** Verizon New York, Inc., a regional LEC ** Verizon Delaware LLC, a regional LEC ** Verizon Maryland, Inc., a regional LEC ** Verizon New Jersey, Inc., a regional LEC **

Verizon Pennsylvania Verizon Pennsylvania LLC, formerly traded as Bell of Pennsylvania, is the Bell Operating Company serving most of Pennsylvania. The company was founded in 1879 as Bell Telephone Company of Philadelphia, owned by National Bell Telephone Company, w ...

, Inc., a regional LEC ** Verizon Washington, D.C., Inc., a regional LEC ** Verizon Virginia, Inc., a regional LEC * Lumen Technologies, Inc. (formerly ''CenturyLink, Inc.''), an independent LEC holding company ** Qwest Communications International, Inc., a holding company acquired in 2011; originally a non-Bell company, acquired and merged

in 2000. *** Qwest Services Corporation, a holding company within the Qwest corporate structure **** Qwest Corporation, a regional LEC, originally Mountain Bell, includes defunct Malheur Bell, Northwestern Bell, Pacific Northwest Bell ;Other "Bell Operating Companies" CincinnatiBell (vectorized)

The following telephone companies are considered independent of the Baby Bells: * Cincinnati Bell, Inc., an independent LEC holding company ** Cincinnati Bell Telephone Company LLC, a LEC of which AT&T owned 27.8% before 1984 and thus was left separate in the 1984 break-up *

Consolidated Communications Consolidated Communications Holdings, Inc., doing business as Consolidated Communications, is an American broadband and business communications provider headquartered in Mattoon, Illinois. The company provides data, internet, voice, managed an ...

Holdings, Inc., an independent LEC holding company ** FairPoint Communications, Inc., an LEC holding company sold to Consolidated in 2017 *** Consolidated Communications of Northern New England Company LLC, a regional LEC created when Verizon New England lines in

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and nor ...

and

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

were sold to

FairPoint FairPoint Communications, Inc. was headquartered in Charlotte, North Carolina, and operated communication services in 31 markets in 17 states, mostly in rural areas. FairPoint services include local and long distance phone service, data, Interne ...

in 2008 *** Consolidated Communications of Vermont Company LLC, a regional LEC created when Verizon New England lines in

Vermont Vermont () is a U.S. state, state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York (state), New York to the west, and the Provin ...

were sold to FairPoint in 2008 * Frontier Communications Corporation, an independent LEC holding company ** Frontier Communications ILEC Holdings, Inc., an LEC holding company created by

Verizon Verizon Communications Inc., commonly known as Verizon, is an American multinational telecommunications conglomerate and a corporate component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The company is headquartered at 1095 Avenue of the Americas ...

and sold to Frontier in 2010 ** Frontier West Virginia, Inc., a regional LEC, formerly C&P Telephone of West Virginia ** The Southern New England Telephone Company, a regional LEC that AT&T owned 16.8% of before 1984 and thus was left separate by the 1984 break-up (subsequently acquired by SBC and then sold to Frontier by the new AT&T after the SBC-AT&T merger) ; Other "Bell System" companies The following companies were divested after 1984 from AT&T Corp. or the Baby Bells and do not provide telephone service. *

Lucent Technologies Lucent Technologies, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications equipment company headquartered in Murray Hill, New Jersey. It was established on September 30, 1996, through the divestiture of the former AT&T Technologies business u ...

, a research and equipment manufacturing company spun-off in 1995; merged with French company Alcatel in 2006 to form

Alcatel-Lucent Alcatel–Lucent S.A. () was a French–American global telecommunications equipment company, headquartered in Boulogne-Billancourt, France. It was formed in 2006 by the merger of France-based Alcatel and U.S.-based Lucent, the latter being a su ...

which was acquired by Finland's

Nokia Corporation Nokia Corporation (natively Nokia Oyj, referred to as Nokia) is a Finnish multinational telecommunications, information technology, and consumer electronics corporation, established in 1865. Nokia's main headquarters are in Espoo, Finland, i ...

in 2016 ** Western Electric Company, Incorporated, a former telecommunications and recording equipment-manufacturing company that ceased to have that name as of the 1984 break-up *** Alcatel-Lucent Bell, a subsidiary of Alcatel-Lucent that was founded in

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to ...

in 1882, by Western Electric; came into Alcatel-Lucent ownership via

and Alcatel ** Bell Telephone Laboratories, Inc., the former AT&T-corporate research unit known as Bell Labs: also spun-off to Lucent Technologies, became Nokia Bell Labs in 2016 * Avaya, Inc., an equipment manufacturing company spun-off from Lucent in 2000 * LSI Corporation, a holding company **

Agere Systems Agere Systems, Inc. was an integrated circuit components company based in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Spun out of Lucent Technologies in 2002, Agere was merged into LSI Corporation in 2007. LSI was in turn acquired by Avago Technologies in 2014. In ...

, incorporated in 2000, the former Micro Electronics subsidiary of Lucent; was then spun-off in 2002 and acquired by LSI in 2007 * Systimax Solutions, the Western Electric Structured Cabling unit, once part of

AT&T Network Systems Avaya Holdings Corp., often shortened to Avaya (), is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Durham, North Carolina, that provides cloud communications and workstream collaboration services. The company's platform includ ...

, was spun-off from Avaya in 2002 and became part of CommScope * iconectiv, formerly known as Telcordia and Bell Communications Research (Bellcore) Beginning in 1991, the Baby Bells began to consolidate operations or rename their

Bell Operating Companies The Bell System was a system of telecommunication companies, led by the Bell Telephone Company and later by the American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T), that dominated the telephone services industry in North America for over one hundre ...

according to the parent company name, such as "Bell Atlantic – Delaware, Inc." or "U S WEST Communications, Inc.", to unify their corporate images.

Present-day usage of the Bell name

The Bell System service marks, including the circled-bell logo, especially as redesigned by

Saul Bass Saul Bass (; May 8, 1920 – April 25, 1996) was an American graphic designer and Oscar-winning filmmaker, best known for his design of motion-picture title sequences, film posters, and corporate logos. During his 40-year career, Bass wor ...

in 1969, and the words Bell System in text, were used before January 1, 1984, when the

divestiture of its regional operating companies took effect. The word mark ''Bell'', the logo, and other related trademarks, are held by each of the remaining Bell companies, namely AT&T,

, CenturyLink, and Cincinnati Bell.USPTO record for trademark serial no. 73727728
(example "Bell" registration originally held by Pacific Telesis): "Registration is nationwide, but is subject to the condition that registrant shall use the mark only in conjunction with one or more of the following modifiers; "Nevada Bell", "Pacific Bell", "Pacific Telephone", "Pacific Telesis", or "PacTel". Use of a modifier shall be considered to be in conjunction with the mark if it is used in sufficient proximity to the mark such that a reasonable observer would normally view the mark and the modifier in a single visual impression and would recognize that both the mark and the modifier are used by registrant. Registrant's right to exclusive use of the mark is subject to the rights of the ther RBOCs to which concurrent registrations in the mark have also been issued, to use the mark in conjunction with one or more of the modifiers specified in those registrations .. International rights to the marks, except for

, are held by a joint venture of these companies,

Bell IP Holdings Bell IP Holdings is a joint venture of AT&T, Verizon, CenturyLink, and Cincinnati Bell (or their respective subsidiaries) which owns the rights to the former Bell System logos and trademarks outside of the U.S. and Canada. It also administers a v ...

Of the various resulting 1984 spinoffs, only BellSouth actively used and promoted the Bell name and logo during its entire history, from the 1984 break-up to its reunion with the new AT&T in 2006. Similarly, cessation of using either the Bell name or logo occurred for many of the other companies more than a decade after the 1984 break-up as part of an acquisition-related rebranding. The others have only used the marks on rare occasions to maintain their trademark rights, even less now that they have adopted names conceived long after divestiture. Examples include Verizon, which still used the Bell logo on its trucks and payphones until it updated its own logo in 2015, and Qwest, formerly US West, which licenses the

and

Mountain Bell Qwest Corporation is a former Regional Bell Operating Company owned by Lumen Technologies. It was formerly named U S WEST Communications, Inc. from 1991 to 2000, and also formerly named Mountain States Telephone and Telegraph Company from 1911 t ...

names to Unical Enterprises, who makes telephones under the Northwestern Bell name. In 1984, each regional Bell operating company was assigned a set list of names it was allowed to use in combination with the Bell marks. Aside from Cincinnati Bell, all these Bell System names have disappeared from the United States business landscape. Southwestern Bell used both the Bell name and the circled-bell trademark until SBC opted for all of its companies to do business under the "SBC" name in 2002. Bell Atlantic used the Bell name and circled-bell trademark until renaming itself Verizon in 2000. Pacific Bell continued operating in California under that name (or the shortened "PacBell" nickname) until SBC purchased it. In Canada,

( divested from AT&T in 1975) continues to use the Bell name. For the decades that Nortel was named Northern Telecom, its research and development arm was Bell Northern Research. Bell Canada and its holding-company parent, Bell Canada Enterprises, still use the Bell name and used variations of the circled-bell logo until 1977, which until 1976 strongly resembled the 1921 to 1939 Bell System trademark shown above.

References

External links

Bell.com

Bell System Memorial

Blue Bell Telephone Sign History — New England Telephone and Telegraph

Investopedia: Baby Bells
{{Telecommunications Alexander Graham Bell Defunct telecommunications companies of the United States AT&T subsidiaries Companies disestablished in 1984 Telecommunications monopolies American companies disestablished in 1984 Telecommunications companies disestablished in 1984

History

Formation under Bell patent

Kingsbury Commitment

Nationwide monopoly

Subsidiaries

Pre-1956 international holdings

Pre-1984 breakup

1984

Today

Present-day usage of the Bell name

See also

References

External links