MONROE, La, Sept. 12, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- CenturyLink, Inc. (NYSE: CTL) today announced that it is ranked within the top 250 companies on this year's InformationWeek 500, an annual listing of the nation's most innovative users of business technology. The 2012 list was revealed last night at an awards ceremony at the InformationWeek 500 Conference in Dana Point, Calif.

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CenturyLink, the third largest telecommunications provider in the U.S. and a global leader in cloud infrastructure and hosted IT solutions, was recognized by InformationWeek for its efforts to integrate its systems following the acquisitions of Qwest and Savvis in 2011. The company's IT department has been working diligently to develop efficiencies and deliver synergies within its systems to support the company's growth.

"CenturyLink's efforts to deliver synergy have led us to consolidate systems and reduce our system support costs," said Bill Bradley, CenturyLink chief information officer. "Improvements to our end-to-end processes and a reduction in system complexities better positions the company to compete in our industry and serve business and government customers more effectively."

"The InformationWeek 500 has recognized the most innovative users of business technology for 24 years, and this year's innovations were particularly impressive," said InformationWeek Editor In Chief Rob Preston. "What the editors looked for are unconventional approaches—new technologies, new models, new ways of grabbing business opportunities and solving complex business problems with IT."

InformationWeek identifies and honors the nation's most innovative users of information technology with its annual 500 listing, and also tracks the technology, strategies, investments, and administrative practices of America's best-known companies. The InformationWeek 500 rankings are unique among corporate rankings as it spotlights the power of innovation in information technology, rather than simply identifying the biggest IT spenders.

Additional details on the InformationWeek 500 can be found online at www.informationweek.com/iw500/.

About CenturyLink
CenturyLink is the third largest telecommunications company in the United States and is recognized as a leader in the network services market by technology industry analyst firms. The company is a global leader in cloud infrastructure and hosted IT solutions for enterprise customers. CenturyLink provides data, voice and managed services in local, national and select international markets through its high-quality advanced fiber optic network and multiple data centers for businesses and consumers. The company also offers advanced entertainment services under the CenturyLink^TM Prism^TM TV and DIRECTV brands. Headquartered in Monroe, La., CenturyLink is an S&P 500 company and is included among the Fortune 500 list of America's largest corporations. For more information, visit www.centurylink.com.

About InformationWeek Business Technology Network (http://www.informationweek.com)
The InformationWeek Business Technology Network provides IT executives with unique analysis and tools that parallel their work flow—from defining and framing objectives through to the evaluation and recommendation of solutions. Anchored by InformationWeek, the multimedia powerhouse that looks across the enterprise, the network scales across the most critical technology categories with online properties such as DarkReading.com (security), NetworkComputing.com (networking and communications) and BYTE (consumer technology). The network also provides focused content for key IT targets, such as CIOs, developers and SMBs, via InformationWeek Global CIO, Dr. Dobb's and InformationWeek SMB, as well as vital vertical industries with InformationWeek Financial Services, Government and Healthcare sites. Content is at the nucleus of our information distribution strategy—IT professionals turn to our experts and communities to stay informed, get advice and research technologies to make strategic business decisions.

SOURCE CenturyLink, Inc.