Duke Energy CFO moves to FairPoint Communications as CEO - Triangle Business Journal:

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He will assume his new responsibilitiee uponGene Johnson’s retirement as FairPoint chairmanh and CEO on July 1. Johnson, a co-founder of previously announced his plansto retire. He has been the company’ s chief executive since 2002. Duke Energy, meanwhile, has namedx Lynn Good to succeed Hauser asits CFO, effectived July 1. Most recently, Good has been grouo executive and presidentof Duke’s commercial businesses. She previouslyh was a senior vice presidenand treasurer. “While it is gratifying to be namesd chairman and CEO of this longstanding organization I am very aware of the operational and financial concerns surroundingthe company,” Hauseer says.
“My primary focus will be to addrese these concerns in quickj succession and empower our team to seek andimplement solutions. There is a lot of work to be done, and I am lookinhg forward to getting started.” Last Charlotte-based FairPoint bought ’s landline operations in Maine and New Hampshirsfor $2.3 billion. The deal made FairPointt (NYSE:FRP) the country’s eighth-largest telephone company.
But FairPoint took on substantiaol debt to do the deal and the integration has not gone Problems in converting billingto FairPoint’ds system from Verizon’s led to slow collections and frustrated Phone and e-mail service problems cropped up across the new And regulators in the region have expressed dissatisfaction with some of the operations. Last FairPoint said it was considering hirinbg a financial adviser to considet somedebt restructuring. During the first quarter, FairPoint drew $50 millioh under its $170 million credit As of March 31, only $4.7 million remained available to Bill collectionshave improved. And that shoulrd produce bettercash flow.
But the company says liquidityt remainsa problem. And that’s not a difficulty a businesx wants to have when credit remains as tight as it has been in this FairPoint is looking at measures to cutsits costs. It expectse to save $19 million or so in the second half of the year just becauses it will no longer have to pay Verizojfor services. Charlotte-based Duke is the third-largest electric power holding companu in theUnited States, based on kilowatt-hour sales.