Many years ago, the Justice Department broke up “Ma Bell” into AT&T (a national long-distance company), thing like AT&T Labs (founder of Unix), and lots of baby bells, including Bell Atlantic (now Verizon), Southwestern Bell (later SBC and now at&t), Pacific Telesis (later SBC later at&t), Bell South, etc. It was believed the parent would be profitable, and the baby bells less so.
How things change.
Today, it is reported that at&t has reached a deal to purchase BellSouth, bringing the old AT&T even closer to existing again (but I don’t think they can purchase Unix). When this deal goes through, Cingular Wireless will again become AT&T Wireless (of course, this is no relation to the former PacTel Cellular, which became Airtouch, which became Verizon Wireless).
This, of course, is the most legal form of incest.
