In 2004 AT&T Wireless merged with Cingular Wireless.  The two companies combined to form one of the largest wireless phone carriers in the United States, and became the first step towards reassembly of the "Ma Bell" of old.  This past week, parent company AT&T Inc announced that the wireless brand would be moved into the new AT&T brand, abandoning the previous name that had been building recognition over the past 6 years.  The "new" AT&T is a centralization of all services and brands operating beneath the AT&T Inc aegis.

Some in the US may remember "Ma Bell", AT&T, or the American Telephone & Telegraph company.  From 1907 until 1982, through government regulation and savvy business maneuvering they became one of the largest monopolies in US history and were pretty much the only game in town if you wanted to make a phone call.  Broken up into the "Baby Bell" companies in 1982, over the past decade or so through acquisitions and mergers, have come full-circle back to Ma Bell with the purchase of the remnants of AT&T by SBC Communications (the reconstitution of the Baby Bells into one company) in 2005, finally approved in late 2006 by the FCC.

So now, 25 years after AT&T broke apart, everything has come back together.  All under one name, all services sold and managed centrally.  Ma Bell is back.