Formed to take advantage of the current round of consolidation in the paging industry, a fairly new company announced its first purchase-the paging assets and operations of Bell Atlantic Corp.
The New Jersey-based company has not yet come up with a name under which it will do business, so for now it is calling itself BAP Acquisition Corp., in reference to its first property. However, the two companies are totally separate.
Terms of the sale were not disclosed, but BAP Acquisition expects to complete the sale by the end of the year.
Bell Atlantic has paging networks in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia and Washington, D.C. The company has about 240,000 paging customers and ranked 18th on the RCR Top 20 Paging Carriers list last year.
According to Cathy Spagnolo, BAP Acquisition spokeswoman, the company was formed last year by John Adiletta, who will take the helm of Bell Atlantic Paging when the sale is complete.
“Bell Atlantic Paging is a high-quality, well-managed, premier paging company and an excellent platform for our overall strategic plan and our operations in the mid-Atlantic,” Adiletta said.
According to Spagnolo, BAP Acquisition plans to acquire enough paging companies to “become a dominant operator in the Northeast.”
Bell Atlantic Mobile will continue to provide paging services to its customers through a resale agreement with BAP Acquisition following the sale.
Bell Atlantic is one of several cellular carriers that have sold or plan to sell paging properties.
U S West Inc., BellSouth Corp. and AT&T Corp. also have chosen to get out of the paging business.
Adiletta served 10 years as executive vice president and chief operating officer of PageAmerica Group Inc. and five years ago established PCS Management Group, a financial advisory mergers and acquisitions firm for paging properties.
Deerfield Capital L.P., a principal of BAP Acquisition, will serve as investment banker for the Bell Atlantic Paging sale.
