Verizon CFO: Spectrum Sale to 'Play Out' in Q1
Verizon Wireless now expects to sell parts of its A and B Block 700MHz spectrum and is developing internal plans for the rest of this 4G spectrum.
Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) CFO Fran Shammo gave some insight into those plans at the Wells Fargo & Co. conference Thursday. "We have to let this process play out and I think it will play out by the first quarter," said Shammo.
"The auction is still ongoing and there we have some what I would call very serious discussions ongoing," he told the financial crowd. Shammo reiterated that the operator doesn't consider this spectrum a "bargain" buy and wants a "serious" price for the bandwidth.
"There are other portions that we probably won't sell and that we are developing internal plans for," he added.
Verizon said it would sell A and B Block spectrum it won at auction in 2008 in April 2012, but only if it won its bid for an Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum swap. The swap was approved at the end of August.
LTE Rising The CFO also provided an update on its 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) network.
"We will have completed this build by mid-2013," Shammo said. "We have more coverage than all of our competitors combined"
Verizon currently covers 419 markets and more than 80 percent of the U.S. population. Rival AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) said this week that it intends to complete its LTE build in 2014, covering more than 300 million people, or 99 percent of the U.S. population. (See AT&T Puts Up $14B to Boost Broadband.)
"I now have 35 percent of my data traffic running on LTE," the CFO added later, suggesting that this will likely mean that 2013 capex will "stay flat" with 2012 wireless spending as the operator adds capacity to support growing data usage on the 4G network.
For more
Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) CFO Fran Shammo gave some insight into those plans at the Wells Fargo & Co. conference Thursday. "We have to let this process play out and I think it will play out by the first quarter," said Shammo.
"The auction is still ongoing and there we have some what I would call very serious discussions ongoing," he told the financial crowd. Shammo reiterated that the operator doesn't consider this spectrum a "bargain" buy and wants a "serious" price for the bandwidth.
"There are other portions that we probably won't sell and that we are developing internal plans for," he added.
Verizon said it would sell A and B Block spectrum it won at auction in 2008 in April 2012, but only if it won its bid for an Advanced Wireless Services (AWS) spectrum swap. The swap was approved at the end of August.
LTE Rising The CFO also provided an update on its 4G Long Term Evolution (LTE) network.
"We will have completed this build by mid-2013," Shammo said. "We have more coverage than all of our competitors combined"
Verizon currently covers 419 markets and more than 80 percent of the U.S. population. Rival AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) said this week that it intends to complete its LTE build in 2014, covering more than 300 million people, or 99 percent of the U.S. population. (See AT&T Puts Up $14B to Boost Broadband.)
"I now have 35 percent of my data traffic running on LTE," the CFO added later, suggesting that this will likely mean that 2013 capex will "stay flat" with 2012 wireless spending as the operator adds capacity to support growing data usage on the 4G network.
For more
- The Best 3G & 4G Cities in America
- Verizon Sells 4.5M 4G LTE Devices in Q3
- MobileCON 2012: Verizon Beats 2012 4G Target
- Verizon: 4G Questions Still in the Air
- Verizon Wireless's Spectrum Deals Sail Through
EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES
sponsor supplied content
Educational Resources Archive
FEATURED VIDEO
UPCOMING LIVE EVENTS
February 7-9, 2023, Virtual Event
February 15, 2023, Virtual Event
March 15-16, 2023, Embassy Suites, Denver, CO
March 21, 2023, Virtual Event
May 15-17, 2023, Austin, TX
December 6-7, 2023, New York City
UPCOMING WEBINARS
February 2, 2023
DIY Data Center Automation Deep Dive: Challenges and Opportunities for CSPs, Enterprises, and Cloud Providers
February 7, 2023
Optical Networking Digital Symposium - Day 1
February 9, 2023
Optical Networking Digital Symposium - Day 2
February 14, 2023
Achieve Your Growth Potential with Next-Gen Content Delivery
February 15, 2023
Digital Divide Digital Symposium
February 16, 2023
SCTE® LiveLearning for Professionals Webinar™ Series: Getting the Edge on Edge Computing
Webinar Archive
PARTNER PERSPECTIVES - content from our sponsors
How 5G Thrives ASEAN Digital Economy
By Huawei
Capitalizing On 5G Innovation To Deliver Breakthroughs At The Edge
By Kerry Doyle, sponsored by ZTE
All Partner Perspectives
GUEST PERSPECTIVES - curated contributions
Telco vs. Cable: Who comes out on top?
By Cheenu Seshadri, Managing Partner, Three Horizon Advisors
Don't worry about the government?
By Patrick Donegan, Principal Analyst, HardenStance
All Guest Perspectives
Verizon has really done a smooth job managing capex through their LTE transistion. Compare AT&T's fit and starts at 4G instead.
You'd think investors and analysts would be happy with that.
It's worth listening to the call I linked to, Shammo gets repeated questions about the Vodaphone share. I'd think it be relatively clear that there's no movement on that coming any time soon by now