DSL losses compensated by strong FiOS quarter...
08:34AM Tuesday Jan 27 2009 by Karl Bode
Verizon lost 96,000 DSL customers last quarter for a number of reasons, not least of which are the recession, housing bubble and tight household budgets. Not helping much was the fact that Verizon had been diverting a lot of DSL marketing and support resources for promoting FiOS. Also not helping is the fact that Verizon's fastest speed in many markets remains just 3Mbps, and customers in these areas have been defecting to cable. While Verizon's FiOS and wireless businesses are doing well, their DSL business has been hit hard.
To counter this, Verizon has started pushing DSL a little harder. Last October, Verizon upgraded their entry-level DSL tier to 1 Mbps downstream and 384 kbps upstream -- up from 768 Kbps/128 Kbps. The telco also revamped their bundles slightly for the 1Mbps, 3Mbps and 7Mbps tiers, reducing double and triple play pricing anywhere from $5 to $30, depending on what services and speeds users chose.
Earlier this month, Verizon again started offering DSL pricing for life -- a concept they offered for a while back in 2007. According Verizon, (see press release), new Verizon customers who sign a two year contract keep their pricing for as long as they keep the service. Obviously the usefulness of this promotion is limited if DSL prices drop, or if you're able to get better deal by renegotiating one year deals (which is often the case) or switching carriers.
So are the new promotions helping Verizon's DSL numbers? Not so much. But it may not matter. The company released their fourth quarter earnings today which indicate the company lost 68,000 DSL customers. However, Verizon's investment in FTTH is more than offsetting those losses -- the telco adding 282,000 new FiOS customers and/or 303,000 FiOSTV customers, giving Verizon a total of 8.9 million broadband customers. The FiOS numbers are surging because of Verizon's recent ability to more efficiently deploy FiOS to apartment buildings.
Of course things are looking even brighter for Verizon once you include their wireless division, now buoyed by the addition of Alltel subscribers. Not including Alltel users, Verizon added 1.4 million wireless subscribers on the quarter.
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Earlier this month, Verizon again started offering DSL pricing for life -- a concept they offered for a while back in 2007. According Verizon, (see press release), new Verizon customers who sign a two year contract keep their pricing for as long as they keep the service. Obviously the usefulness of this promotion is limited if DSL prices drop, or if you're able to get better deal by renegotiating one year deals (which is often the case) or switching carriers.
So are the new promotions helping Verizon's DSL numbers? Not so much. But it may not matter. The company released their fourth quarter earnings today which indicate the company lost 68,000 DSL customers. However, Verizon's investment in FTTH is more than offsetting those losses -- the telco adding 282,000 new FiOS customers and/or 303,000 FiOSTV customers, giving Verizon a total of 8.9 million broadband customers. The FiOS numbers are surging because of Verizon's recent ability to more efficiently deploy FiOS to apartment buildings.
Of course things are looking even brighter for Verizon once you include their wireless division, now buoyed by the addition of Alltel subscribers. Not including Alltel users, Verizon added 1.4 million wireless subscribers on the quarter.
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