Randall Stephenson

Randall Stephenson   ( businessman)
Born	Randall Lynn Stephenson 1960-04-22  Oklahoma City,  Oklahoma,  United States
Nationality	US
Alma mater	•  University of Central Oklahoma •  University of Oklahoma
Children	2
Spouse	Lenise
Member of	Council on Foreign Relations/Members 3
"Screw the customers, I'm taking care of the shareholders..."  President of the Boy Scouts of America  In office May 26, 2016 - 2018

Randall Stephenson is a US business executive who attended the 2017 Bilderberg meeting. During his tenure as CEO of AT&T, Stephenson was frequently quoted as having stated, "Screw the customers, I'm taking care of the shareholders."

Education

Stephenson received a Bachelor of Science in Accounting from the University of Central Oklahoma and a Master of Accountancy from the University of Oklahoma,

Career

In 1982, he began his professional career by joining Southwestern Bell Telephone, one of the telephone providers spun off by AT&T as part of an antitrust proceeding. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, he then held various management positions in the field of finance. In July 2001, he became Chief Financial Officer at SBC Communications, where he managed to reduce the annual losses of almost $30 billion to an almost balanced balance sheet by 2004. In 2003 and 2004, he was CEO of the Cingular Wireless mobile communications company, which was acquired by AT&T Wireless in 2007. From April 2004 he was Chief Operating Officer at SBC. Even after the acquisition of SBC by AT&T, he remained COO, responsible for the mobile communications business. He then became CEO at AT&T in 2007.

In December 2004, George W. Bush announced that he would appoint Stephenson to the National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee.

During his tenure as CEO, AT&T acquired DirecTV for $49 billion in July 2015 and Time Warner for $85 billion in June 2018. According to Drew FitzGerald of The Wall Street Journal, Stephenson has "transformed the phone company he inherited into one of the world's biggest entertainment companies."

Stephenson was chairman of the Business Roundtable from 2014 to 2016.

In April 2020, Stephenson announced that he would step down as CEO on July 1, 2020. However, he remained chairman of the Board of Directors, which is superior to the Management Board, until January 2021.

Boy scouting

He was the 37th National President of the Boy Scouts of America, from 2016 until 2018. Stephenson, as well as fellow board member Jim Turley, CEO of Ernst & Young, publicly opposed the BSA's practice of banning openly gay Scouts and stated their intention "to work from within the BSA Board to actively encourage dialogue and [sustainable progress."

 

Events Participated in

Event	Start	End	Location(s)	Description
Bilderberg/2017	1 June 2017	4 June 2017	US Virginia Chantilly	The 65th Bilderberg Meeting
WEF/Annual Meeting/2014	22 January 2014	25 January 2014	Switzerland WEF	2603 guests in Davos considered "Reshaping The World"
WEF/Annual Meeting/2016	20 January 2016	23 January 2016	Switzerland WEF	Attended by over 2500 people, both leaders and followers, who were explained how the Fourth Industrial Revolution would changed everything, including being a "revolution of values".
WEF/Annual Meeting/2017	17 January 2017	20 January 2017	Switzerland WEF	2952 known participants, including prominently Bill Gates. "Offers a platform for the most effective and engaged leaders to achieve common goals for greater societal leadership."

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