Southern Company is a regulated utility holding company based in the Southeast U.S. Its core business is generating and delivering electricity to roughly 4.6 million retail customers in Alabama, Georgia, and Mississippi through three vertically integrated electric utilities — Alabama Power, Georgia Power, and Mississippi Power — which own generation, transmission, and distribution assets. Georgia Power is by far the largest. Southern Company also distributes natural gas to approximately 4.4 million customers across Illinois, Georgia, Virginia, and Tennessee through Southern Company Gas, whose primary utilities are Nicor Gas in Illinois and Atlanta Gas Light in Georgia. A fourth segment, Southern Power, operates a wholesale power generation business selling electricity under long-term power purchase agreements to utilities, municipalities, and commercial customers. The traditional electric utilities earn returns through state-regulated rates on their rate base — the capital invested in generation, transmission, and distribution assets — meaning rate base growth drives earnings growth. Fuel costs are passed through to customers via regulatory mechanisms. A major near-term growth driver is the surge in data center and industrial load in Georgia: Georgia Power has contracted roughly 9 GW of new large-load customers and has a $19.5B state-certified generation and transmission construction program through 2030. Southern Company Gas earns returns through a similar regulated model, with most utilities having weather normalization mechanisms. Southern Power has contracted nearly all of its capacity through 2030 under long-term, fixed-price agreements.