Leadership Team

Bentina C. Terry, CEO

Bentina C. Terry is President and CEO of Southern Linc and Southern Telecom, Inc. These Southern Company subsidiaries provide mission critical LTE wireless and dark fiber networks and services to Southern Company electric utilities and to external customers. 

Terry comes to Southern Linc and STI from Georgia Power where she served as senior vice president of Customer Strategy and Solutions. She joined Georgia Power in 2001 and during her career, held roles of increasing responsibility in External Affairs, Legislative and Regulatory Affairs, Community and Economic Development, Corporate Communication, Sales and Marketing, Customer Service, Compliance and Ethics, Corporate Services and Power Delivery at Gulf Power, Georgia Power and Southern Nuclear, where she served as General Counsel and Corporate Secretary. 

Prior to Southern Company, Terry supported Georgia Power and Southern Company at Troutman Sanders (now Troutman Pepper) as a labor and employment lawyer. She also served as the Associate General Counsel at Progress Energy (now Duke Energy) in Raleigh, NC.

In the community, she serves on the board of directors for the International Women's Forum - Georgia, Leadership Atlanta where she currently serves as chair and the North Carolina State University Foundation Board where she serves as Vice Chair.

For several consecutive years, she has been selected as one of Atlanta Magazine's 500 Most Influential Atlantans, one of Atlanta Business League's 100 Most Influential Women, as well as one of the National Diversity Council's 100 Most Influential Women in Energy. She was also named one of the Greater Atlanta YWCA's Women of Achievement in 2020 and was recently honored with the United Negro College Fund's Billye Suber Aaron award for her work in the community.

She is a member of the North Carolina State Bar and the Georgia State Bar, Leadership Atlanta, Leadership North Carolina, Leadership Florida, the International Women's Forum, Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Inc., and The Links, Incorporated.

She has received various awards and recognitions for her contribution to the state of Florida including being named one of Influence Magazine's 100 Most Influential People in Florida Politics (2015). She was also an International Women's Forum (IWF) Fellow in 2012 and a 2017 graduate of the Atlanta Regional Commission's Regional Leadership Institute.

Arnab Ghosal, Vice President and Chief Operating Officer

Arnab Ghosal is the Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Southern Telecom.  Southern Telecom is the telecommunications subsidiary of Southern Company.  Founded in 1997 and headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, Southern Telecom provides wholesale dark fiber optic solutions to the business community.  

Prior to his role at Southern Telecom Arnab spent 18 years at Alabama Power.  He has had several different roles within the Power Delivery Organization which include Substation Maintenance Engineer, Alabama Control Center Operator, Protection and Control Engineer, Substation Construction Scheduler, Assistant to Power Delivery SVP, Connectivity and Innovation Manger and Grid Inform & Connectivity General Manager.

He is currently serving on the board at the American Red Cross (Bham Chapter), Embrace Alabama Kids and the Alabama Power Service Organization. He was also selected as a 2019 Aspen Ideas Scholar, 2021 Birmingham Business Journal Top 40 Under 40, 2022 Fortnightly 40 under 40 and a participant in the 2022 Young Americans Leader Program at Harvard Business School.

Arnab received his Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from the University of Alabama as well as a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Alabama-Birmingham.

Frank Raimondo, Operations Manager

Frank serves as Operations Manager for Southern Telecom having joined the team in January 2022.  His responsibilities cover all aspects of internal-facing operations.  These include contract management, customer and supplier invoice processing, financial and accounting support, process improvement and special projects management.

Prior to joining STI, Frank spent over a decade working in the Global Sourcing department of Equifax where he performed category management in a variety of IT areas as well as helped to manage some very large Outsourcing portfolios ($100M+).

Prior to Equifax, Frank spent 5 years working at Southern Company in their Services Organization as well as at Georgia Power.  In these roles he covered a variety of areas including IT Sourcing, Vendor Management and Contract Management.  Other experiences include IT and Telecom Consulting most notably for Telcordia Technologies where he helped STI with their commercial launch.  As well, Frank spent 13 years with Ontario Hydro providing Data Center Operations and Maintenance services at their System Control Center in Toronto.

Frank, a native of Montreal, has a rich and diverse background both personally and professionally.  He has lived and/or worked all over the world in places such as Montreal, Toronto, Catania (Sicily), Rome (Italy), Kyiv (Ukraine), Rhode Island, New Jersey, Miami and currently, Atlanta.

Frank is an Electrical Engineer and holds an MBA in Finance.  His career has spanned System Control Center Operations, Project Management, IT Consulting and Supply Chain Management/Procurement.  He even created and managed a weekly newspaper for a very brief time.

Frank is an active member of the AITP (Association of IT Professionals) Atlanta Chapter and serves on its board.  He is also an avid off-road motorcyclist most notably having competed in the Baja 1000 desert race some years back.

Michael Lamar, Carrier Account Executive

Michael Lamar serves as Carrier Account Executive with Southern Telecom. Lamar is responsible for new client acquisition and management of clients in the telecom carrier, content provider, and large enterprise categories.

Lamar is experienced in telecom sales. He brings a concentration of knowledge in the development of fiber service routes and fiber network expansion projects to his position. Lamar is also skilled in PON, VoIP and MPLS network solutions. He has expertise in serving government, healthcare and automotive sectors as well.

Lamar holds a B.S. degree in organizational management from Voorhees College. He is also a graduate of the Leadership Augusta and Leadership Columbia County programs. He resides in Augusta, Georgia. He is married with three children. Previously, he served as an Ambassador for Augusta and North Augusta Chambers of Commerce, the Board of Directors for the Salvation Army of Augusta and the Easter Seals Society of Augusta.

Steve Laufersweiler, Carrier Account Executive

Steve Laufersweiler serves as Carrier Account Executive with Southern Telecom. He is responsible for management of existing STI customers, identifying new business opportunities within the competitive telecom marketplace, closing sales transactions, analyzing the market, developing and managing new business development plans, all while building long term business relationships.

Laufersweiler is a telecom industry veteran, experienced in business development and revenue generation. He brings expertise in a broad range of services including, cloud, network and managed services, colocation, data center ops, data center connectivity and more.

Laufersweiler is a board member of Atlanta Telecom Professionals (ATP) and the Technology Association of Georgia (TAG). He has also served as a Dale Carnergie Instructor for Public Speaking. He earned his Bachelor of Science degree in Marketing from Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.

Rebecca Garcia, Comptroller and Director of Financial Operations

Rebecca Garcia joined Southern Linc in October 2018 to serve as Comptroller and Director of Financial Operations.  In this role, Rebecca is responsible for the Accounting and Finance organizations of both Southern Linc and Southern Telecom.  Rebecca began her career at Gulf Power Company, a previous subsidiary of Southern Company, in 1998 in Revenue Accounting and worked in various Accounting departments, including Materials Accounting, Corporate Accounting, Financial and Regulatory Reporting, Financial Planning, Enterprise Solutions Project Implementation, and Budgeting. She began her previous role as Assistant Comptroller of Gulf Power in August 2017 and assisted in the divestiture of Gulf Power to NextEra Energy through May 2019.  

Rebecca has a Bachelor of Science degree with a Major in Accounting from Pensacola Christian College and is a Certified Public Accountant in the State of Virginia.