LV loses phone company offices to NY

Wednesday, Nov. 17, 1999 | 11:14 a.m.

MGC Communications Inc., an upstart telephone company, is quietly moving its corporate headquarters from Las Vegas to Rochester, N.Y.

Based in Las Vegas since the company's inception in 1996, MGC issued national news releases this week referring to itself as being based in Rochester, N.Y.

A company spokesman today acknowledged the change of the company's headquarters, but said he does not know specifics of the scope of the shift to Rochester.

"I honestly don't know," said MGC's Jeff Hein when asked about the move and how MGC employees would be affected.

Hein said a meeting is planned next week to resolve details of the move. Employees have begun questioning how they would be affected and whether their positions would be moved east.

Late last month, MGC named Rolla Huff president and chief executive officer. Huff was president and chief operating officer of Frontier Corp. and was based in Rochester.

Hein said one of Huff's stipulations for taking the position was to be allowed to continue to work in Rochester, where he has a number of Wall Street contacts that could help fuel the company's rapid growth plan. Two announcements this week involved both a Rochester connection and MGC's growth plan.

MGC issued releases this week, both referencing Rochester as company headquarters, announcing the appointment of a new chief financial officer and a public stock offering.

Michael Daley, formerly chief financial officer of Concentrix Corp., a data base management and marketing company, was named executive vice president and chief financial officer of MGC.

A 14-year employee with ACC Corp., a telecommunications company that merged with Teleport Communications Group Inc., Daley will be based in Rochester and will work with the day-to-day management of the company and business development.

He replaces Linda Sunbury, who has been chief financial officer of MGC for two years. She will remain in a senior position in the accounting and finance division of the company in Las Vegas.

The company also announced plans for the public offering of stock with the proceeds to fund the company's expansion and rollout of digital subscriber line technology.

The company plans to offer DSL, which makes transmission of data and voice over one line possible, in Las Vegas, Atlanta, Chicago, Southern California and Southern Florida. MGC plans to expand into an additional 20 markets in 2000.

The company plans to file a registration statement with the Securities and Exchange Commission to make an underwritten public offering of common equity through a prospectus only.

MGC recently ranked 12th in the Bloomberg Tech 100 listing the fastest growing technology companies in the United States based on sales growth for the last fiscal year.