CenturyLink Inc., a Louisiana-based rural telephone company, announced this morning it will buy Qwest Communications International Inc. for about $10.6 billion in stock. Qwest, which is based in Denver, employs approximately 1,550 people in Iowa, with more than 800 of those employees in Des Moines.

The merger combines two of the largest landline telephone companies in the United States, Reuters reported. The all-stock deal is expected to double CenturyLink’s sales to almost $20 billion, the companies said in a statement today. The transaction will give Qwest shareholders about $6.02 a share, a 15 percent premium to yesterday’s closing stock price. CenturyLink also will assume about $11.8 billion in debt.

Other companies are making similar acquisitions to increase their scale and reduce costs. In November, Windstream Corp. of Little Rock, Ark., agreed to buy Iowa Telecommunications Services Inc.

The Qwest purchase allows CenturyLink, formerly CenturyTel Inc., to move into four new states and add customers in 10 more. CenturyLink, which in November announced a $6 billion purchase of Embarq Corp., has approximately 20,000 employees in 33 states. The company currently has about 1,500 telephone customers in Iowa.

Joanna Hjelmeland, a Qwest spokeswoman in Minneapolis, said it’s too early to know how the merger may affect Qwest employment levels. “But we believe it will be stronger financially, so it will be a better place for employees to be,” she said. “There are going to be places where we overlap, but places where we don’t. A transition team from both companies will map those things out.”

Hjelmeland said the merger is expected to be completed sometime in the first half of 2011. “Until then, it will be business as usual for us,” she said.

CenturyLink Chief Executive Glen Post said the Qwest acquisition improves its ability to deploy new high-speed services to business customers, and expands the availability of broadband connections to consumers.

In addition to shareholder approval, the deal would be subject to approval by each state in which the companies operate, which in Iowa will require a reorganization proceeding before the Iowa Utilities Board (IUB), said Rob Hillesland, an IUB spokesman.