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( Nippon Telegraph and Telephone)
Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (??????????, Nippon Denshin Denwa Kabushiki-gaisha?, TYO 9432, NYSE&_160;NTT, LSE NPN), commonly known as NTT, is a telephone company that dominates the telecommunication market in Japan. Ranked the 40th in Fortune Global 500, NTT is the largest telecommunications company in Asia, and the second-largest in the world in terms of revenue. While NTT is listed on Tokyo, New York, and London stock exchanges, the Japanese government still owns roughly one-third of NTT's shares, regulated by the NTT Law. Once established as a monopoly government-owned corporation in 1953, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Public Corporation (????????, Nippon Denshin Denwa Kosha?), the company was privatized in 1985 to encourage competition in the telecom market. Because NTT owns most of last mile, it enjoys oligopolistic control over land lines in Japan. In order to weaken NTT, the company was divided into a holding company (NTT) and three telecom companies (East, West, and Communications) in 1998. The NTT Law regulate NTT East and West to serve only short distance communications, and obligate them to maintain telephone service all over the country. NTT Communications is not regulated by the NTT Law.
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