Meredith Corp. Boosts Bandwidth With AT&T

AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) has announced that Meredith Corporation (NYSE: MDP), one of America's leading media and marketing companies, has signed a networking services contract with AT&T. The three-year agreement worth more than $3 million extends and expands a long-standing relationship. It calls for AT&T to continue delivering Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS)-based services while providing increased bandwidth.

Meredith's businesses center on publishing, television broadcasting, online and integrated marketing services. Meredith's extensive online presence, which includes more than 40 strategic alliances with leading Internet destinations, and its industry-leading consumer database, continue to increase the amount of data flowing over the company's network, increasing the need for more bandwidth.

Under the contract, AT&T will supply network solutions to Meredith's 30 locations around the country, enabling its 3,900 employees to simultaneously access applications from any location. With AT&T's Managed Internet Service (MIS) and Intelligent Content Distribution Service (ICDS), visitors to Meredith's Web sites experience greatly improved performance and speedy downloads, creating a positive customer experience.

AT&T ICDS can significantly improve a Web site's capacity, reliability and performance by replicating information on multiple servers located closer to Web users. Web content and media streams reach users faster and more reliably because AT&T ICDS serves traffic through AT&T's worldwide network of high speed edge servers.

"Creating, managing and delivering creative content is a significant part of our business and drives a highly data-intensive operation, which demands the highest level of network performance from AT&T," said Brad Wyckoff, chief information officer of Meredith Corporation.

"With the pace of our online business activities and overall data distribution requirements, sustainable network stability with the capacity to prioritize the different types of traffic, is essential."

By integrating data, Internet and voice services onto one converged network platform, the AT&T solution will make it possible for Meredith to reach superior levels of performance and reliability. Using AT&T's powerful MPLS platform, Meredith will have the ability to prioritize network traffic to ensure optimal bandwidth and latency for the company's most critical applications. AT&T's MPLS service has achieved the industry's highest levels of reliability and redundancy.

In addition to network services, AT&T will continue to provide Meredith with local and long distance voice services as well as teleconferencing services.

Meredith Corporation (NYSE: MDP) is one of America's premier media and marketing companies. Meredith combines well-known national brands -- including Better Homes and Gardens, Parents, Ladies' Home Journal, Family Circle, American Baby, Fitness and More -- with local television brands in fast growing markets. Meredith is the industry leader in creating content in key consumer interest areas such as home, family, health and wellness and self- development. Meredith then uses multiple distribution platforms -- including print, television, online, mobile and video -- to give consumers content they desire and to deliver the messages of its marketing partners. Additionally, Meredith uses its many assets to create powerful custom marketing solutions for many of the nation's top brands and companies. The goals of these programs are to increase consumer loyalty and produce repeated consumer interaction. In the last two years, Meredith has significantly added to its capabilities in this area through the acquisition of cutting-edge companies in areas such as online, word-of-mouth and database marketing. Meredith employs approximately 3,900 people throughout the United States, including approximately 1,200 in Des Moines and 750 in New York City.

AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) is a premier communications holding company. Its subsidiaries and affiliates, AT&T operating companies, are the providers of AT&T services in the United States and around the world. Among their offerings are the world's most advanced IP-based business communications services and the nation's leading wireless, high speed Internet access and voice services. In domestic markets, AT&T is known for the directory publishing and advertising sales leadership of its Yellow Pages and YELLOWPAGES.COM organizations, and the AT&T brand is licensed to innovators in such fields as communications equipment. As part of its three-screen integration strategy, AT&T is expanding its TV entertainment offerings. In 2008, AT&T again ranked No. 1 on Fortune magazine's World's Most Admired Telecommunications Company list and No. 1 on America's Most Admired Telecommunications Company list.

Source: AT&T Inc.