AT&T Ranked No. 1 for Multicultural Business Opportunities

San Antonio, Texas - AT&T Inc. has been ranked No. 1 among DiversityBusiness.com’s 2006 list of Top Organizations for Multicultural Business Opportunities, also known as the Div50.

This is the seventh consecutive year that AT&T has received this honor from DiversityBusiness.com — AT&T has been included in the list every year since its inception. The former BellSouth Corp., acquired by AT&T in late 2006, ranked fifth among this year’s Div50, thanks to its distinguished record of incorporating diversity businesses into its supply chain.

This year’s Div50 was selected with help from more than 500,000 diversity-owned (women, Blacks, Hispanics, Asians, Native Americans and other minority groups) businesses in the U.S., representing sectors such as technology, manufacturing, food service and professional services. The list is produced annually by DiversityBusiness.com, the nation’s leading multicultural B-to-B Internet Web site, which links large organizational buyers to multicultural product and service suppliers.

“AT&T and the former BellSouth have both worked extremely hard to develop supplier- diversity programs that promote and improve business opportunities for women- and minority-owned businesses throughout their supply chains,” said Maureen Merkle, president of Procurement, AT&T. “Now, together as the new AT&T, we are in an even stronger position to establish valuable partnerships with multicultural businesses, increase the competitiveness of our supply chain and strengthen our world-class diversity programs for the benefit of others in the marketplace.”