Qwest talking to Verizon

Yesterday, we found out that Qwest, an MVNO of the Sprint network, was looking for a better deal. Like other telecommunications companies, their landlines aren’t doing so well, and their broadband is facing competition from faster, more powerful entities. There were hints that they’d try to broker this deal with Sprint, since Sprint has a decent amount of subscriber from its MVNOs. But now they’re talking to Verizon about a possible deal.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Verizon’s CEO (not the CEO of Verizon Wireless, but the company which jointly owns VZW with Vodafone) Ivan Seidenberg has confirmed talks with Qwest.

Verizon doesn’t have a ton of MVNO deals. As far as I know, they offer service to Tracfone and Page Plus…though Alltel uses their network with roaming agreements (as do a few others).

“Initially, the deal would represent the current 824,000 Qwest wireless subs, but should expand over time,” said Tom Watts, analyst at Cowen & Co in a client note.

That’s strange that he says 824,000 subscribers. I saw a report yesterday that said they had 2.1 million customers at the end of 2006. However, a MarketWatch report clears things up: That was their number of broadband customers.

[Reuters]

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