Leo Hindery

President of Broadband & Internet Services

AT & T; Corp.

Englewood, Colo. and New York

Behind AT & T; Chief Executive Michael Armstrong’s sweeping vision of a new cable era stands Leo Hindery.

The 51-year-old president of AT & T;’s broadband and Internet services unit oversees the company’s massive cable TV infrastructure, which will soon reach 60 percent of American homes.

It’s not an easy task. Hindery logs more hours every week on his corporate jet than he does at home with his family.

“If there is anyone who single-handedly turned around the perception of the cable industry and the role of broadband in it, you’d have to say Leo is that person,” said Marc Nathanson, chairman and chief executive of Los Angeles-based Falcon Cable. “His vision to get things done is unparalleled, as is his ability to lead people.”

While not a Los Angeles-based executive, Hindery’s decisions directly affect when and how quickly the city will get wired for the broadband age. By all accounts, he has played a significant behind-the-scenes role in the current City Council controversy over whether cable owners need to open up their networks to competing high-speed Internet services. (Hindery often advises his lieutenants charged with advocating a closed-access policy on federal and regional levels.)

Described as a hands-on manager, Hindery adopts almost an evangelical tone when discussing his plans for AT & T;’s broadband future.

“Timely, affordable, and ubiquitous deployment of digital video, data and telephone services is clearly our end goal,” he said. “It is the ubiquitousness and affordability of these services that will democratize telecommunications in the United States.”

Hindery, the former president and turnaround man for cable company Tele-Communications Inc., has brokered two of the largest deals in recent cable history: AT & T;’s $52 billion acquisition of TCI in 1998, and AT & T;’s pending $58 billion acquisition of MediaOne.

Before moving to TCI, Hindery founded InterMedia Partners, which grew to become the nation’s ninth largest cable operator. Prior to that, he was the chief financial officer for Chronicle Publishing Co., parent of the San Francisco Chronicle.

Raised in Tacoma, Wash., Hindery worked his way through Seattle University with stints in the school cafeteria and on a Merchant Marine ship. He went on to get an MBA at Stanford in 1971.

Sara Fisher