It's a fundamental human need. Connectivity improves our quality of life. It accelerates the velocity of commerce and ideas. It drives prosperity and strength for individuals, companies and nations. It defines AT&T's business — as we help families keep in touch and as we help businesses serve their customers down the street and in far-flung overseas markets.

Today, technology has magnified and globalized the human desire to share information. The demand for connectivity continues to grow swiftly. And few companies in the world can meet that need on a global scale as effectively as AT&T.

Our business network connects more than 160 countries. We power 32 of the world's top 100 Web destinations. Our network handles two-thirds of the credit and debit card transactions in the United States. And we're staying ahead of the evolution of personal and business connectivity by building the world's most extensive IP backbone.

More than 1 billion devices worldwide connect to our network. And that number will only grow. But the real magic is in the expanding array of applications we can deliver through those connections. That's the future of connectivity.

Imagine how much simpler, clearer and more effective human communications would be if everyone spoke the same language. In the digital world, Internet Protocol — IP for short — is that one, common language. IP-based connectivity enables everything from laptops to televisions to ATM machines, and it helps people and businesses communicate seamlessly, easily and accurately across town or around the world.

To deliver on the great promise of IP, we are well under way with the transformation of our wireless and wired networks. We're using IP to extend our ability to connect and power the latest generation of communications applications. As we drive IP technology through our networks, we can make communications more seamless, more interactive and more mobile.

We're also adding more bandwidth to stay ahead of rapidly expanding customer needs. IP traffic on our backbone network has more than doubled in the past two years. We are deploying the world's largest next-generation network, which carries traffic at four times the speed of previous connections. Continued growth of this network will give us the capacity to meet customer expectations for years to come.