Ace Telephone, GLC Seek Post-deal FCC OK, Voice Regret for Error
Ace Telephone Association and Great Lakes Comnet sought post-deal FCC OK of ATA's takeover of GLC and its subsidiaries. ATA subsidiary Ace Telephone Co. of Michigan bought 51 percent control of GLC's common stock Oct. 6, but "inadvertently overlooked" the…
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need to ask for FCC approval of communications license transfers until recently, a joint application for approval said Wednesday. "The Joint Applicants truly regret that they did not obtain prior Commission approval of the transfer of control, and are now promptly seeking to correct that oversight through this Joint Application," the applicants said. FCC approval is in the public interest, said the applicants, which called the oversight "purely inadvertent" and added the companies and their customers, who continue to receive service as they did before the takeover, won't be negatively affected. "The transaction has no adverse impact on customers, and will not trigger any rate increases," they said in an accompanying public interest statement. "As the Joint Applicants are relatively small entities, the transaction has not and should not lead to the concentration of any market share, nor will it present any anti-competitive issues, or eliminate a competitor, because GLC [and its subsidiaries] will continue to provide service as they did before the transfer of control." The applicants asked for special temporary authority to operate for 60 days, pending FCC approval of their license transfer application. ATA and a subsidiary provide local and long distance telecom, broadband and video services in Minnesota, Iowa and Michigan, while GLC and its subsidiaries provide tandem switching and transport services to other telecom carriers in Michigan, and also operate in several other states. GLC is challenging in court an FCC order that sided with AT&T in an access charge dispute (see 1508190065).