August 1, 2011

PAETEC and Windstream today announced plans to become one provider, better positioned to serve you and our mutual customers than any other carrier. Windstream will acquire PAETEC in a stock transaction with plans to market ourselves upon closing under the name Windstream. We expect this transaction to close within six months.

As a PAETEC partner, the benefits for you and your organization are substantial. Together with Windstream, we will have a more dense fiber footprint to your end users, including major metropolitan areas for PAETEC or more rural areas in which Windstream has a presence. We’ll have approximately 100,000 route miles to access for our Resale, VoIP, and traditional Carrier services. And I believe our product portfolio will become stronger than ever.

Many times, our partners have more questions than we have answers such as when you’ll be able to sell across networks or portfolios. Over the next six months, we’ll commit to share with you as much as possible about any developments and how they will help you sell.

The combination of PAETEC and Windstream is exciting and will bring significant advantages to your organization. This channel remains extremely important to the combined organization. As always, thank you for choosing to partner with PAETEC and we look forward to much success in the future.

Best regards,

Doug Derstine
President, Wholesale Markets PAETEC

PAETEC 600 WILLOWBROOK OFFICE PARK FAIRPORT, NY 14450 WWW.PAETEC.COM

Additional Information

This communication relates to the proposed merger transaction pursuant to the terms of the Agreement and Plan of Merger, dated as of July 31, 2011, among PAETEC Holding Corp. ("PAETEC"), Windstream Corporation ("Windstream") and Peach Merger Sub, Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Windstream.

Windstream will file with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”) a registration statement on Form S-4 in connection with the transaction that will include the proxy statement of PAETEC, which also will constitute a prospectus of Windstream. PAETEC will send to its stockholders the proxy statement/prospectus regarding the proposed merger transaction. PAETEC urges investors and security holders to read the proxy statement/prospectus and other documents relating to the merger transaction when they become available, because they will contain important information about PAETEC, Windstream and the proposed transaction. Investors and security holders may obtain a free copy of the Form S-4 and the proxy statement/prospectus and other documents relating to the merger transaction (when available) from the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov, PAETEC’s website at www.paetec.com and Windstream’s website at www.windstream.com. In addition, copies of the proxy statement/prospectus and such other documents may be obtained (when available) from PAETEC free of charge by directing a request to PAETEC Holding Corp., One PAETEC Plaza, Fairport, New York 14450, Attn: Investor Relations, telephone: (585) 340-2500.

Certain Information Regarding Participants

PAETEC and its directors and executive officers may be deemed, under SEC rules, to be participants in the solicitation of proxies from PAETEC’s stockholders with respect to the proposed merger transaction. Security holders may obtain information regarding the names, affiliations and interests of such individuals in PAETEC’s Annual Report on Form 10-K/A for the year ended December 31, 2010, which was filed with the SEC on April 12, 2011, and its definitive proxy statement for the 2011 annual meeting of stockholders, which was filed with the SEC on April 20, 2011. Additional information regarding the interests of such individuals in the proposed merger transaction will be included in the proxy statement/prospectus relating to the proposed transaction when it is filed with the SEC. These documents may be obtained free of charge from the SEC’s website at www.sec.gov, PAETEC’s website at www.paetec.com and Windstream’s website at www.windstream.com.

PAETEC 600 WILLOWBROOK OFFICE PARK FAIRPORT, NY 14450 WWW.PAETEC.COM