SureWest Communications Set to Join Russell 3000 Index

ROSEVILLE, Calif., June 13, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- SureWest Communications (NASDAQ: SURW) is set to join the U.S. broad-market Russell 3000® Index when Russell Investments reconstitutes its comprehensive set of U.S. and global equity indexes on June 24, according to a preliminary list of additions posted June 10 on www.russell.com/indexes.

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Annual reconstitution of Russell's U.S. indexes captures and ranks the 4,000 largest U.S. stocks as of the end of May by total market capitalization. Membership in the Russell 3000, which remains in place for one year, means automatic inclusion in the large-cap Russell 1000® Index or small-cap Russell 2000® Index as well as the appropriate growth and value style indexes. Russell determines membership for its equity indexes primarily by objective, market-capitalization rankings and style attributes.

"SureWest has rejoined the Russell 2000 Index based on our continued growth and strong performance," said Steve Oldham, SureWest's president and CEO. "The decision to expand and grow our core Broadband segment has helped place us in the solid financial position we are in today. The demand for our fiber services from both residential and business customers has enabled us to continue to build out our network and validates our expectations for strong growth moving forward. We are very confident in our growth plan and anticipate generating long-term sustainable free cash flow and additional value for our shareholders."

The Russell 3000 also serves as the U.S. component to the Russell Global Index.

Russell indexes are widely used by investment managers and institutional investors for index funds and as benchmarks for both passive and active investment strategies. An industry-leading $3.9 trillion in institutional assets currently are benchmarked to them. These investment tools originated from Russell's multi-manager investment business in the early 1980s when the company saw the need for a more objective, market-driven set of benchmarks in order to evaluate outside investment managers.

More information about Russell Indexes, including total returns, is available at http://www.russell.com/Indexes/data/default.asp.

About SureWest

SureWest Communications (www.surewest.com) is a leading integrated communications provider and the bandwidth leader in the markets it serves. Headquartered in Northern California for more than 95 years, SureWest offers bundled residential and commercial services in the greater Sacramento and Kansas City regions that include IP-based digital and high-definition television, high-speed Internet, Voice over IP, and local and long distance telephone. SureWest was the nation's first provider to launch residential HDTV over an IP network and offers one of the nation's fastest symmetrical Internet services with speeds of up to 50 Mbps in each direction on its fiber-to-the-home network.

About Russell

Russell Investments provides strategic advice, world-class implementation, state-of-the-art performance benchmarks and a range of institutional-quality investment products. Russell has about $161 billion in assets under management as of March 31, 2011, and serves individual, institutional and advisor clients in more than 35 countries. Founded in 1936, Russell is a subsidiary of The Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Company.  

Contacts:
Ron Rogers
Corporate Communications
916-746-3123
[email protected]

Misty Wells
Investor Relations
916-786-1799
[email protected]

SOURCE SureWest Communications