In the United States, VERIZON (turnover of 53 million dollars in 2004 with 203,000 employees) has bought the American number two in the field of long-distance telephony, MCI (turnover of 15.7 dollars in 2004 with 40,000 employees) for 5.3 billion dollars (4.8 billion in shares and 488 million in cash, and a special dividend of 4.5 dollars a share). QWEST was also interested in MCI.