Lowell C. McAdam

Verizon Communications, Inc., or more commonly known as Verizon, is a holdings company that utilizes its subsidiaries to offer several different services. These include, bur are not limited to, communications, information, and entertainment products and services to consumer, businesses, and government agencies. Verizon is currently one of the top communications companies in the world, as they hold the 15 spot on the Fortune 500. They have recently become the largest 4G LTE distributor within America, as well as having the premier all-fiber broadband network. Verizon serves 150 countries worldwide, and has a reaches over 112 million people through it’s network.

Currently, Lowell C. McAdam, is currently both the CEO and chairman of the company. He was appointed CEO in 2011, and chairman in 2012. McAdam’s has been a prominent figure in wireless communications even before joining the company in 2000. Under his leadership, the company has been able to buy out Vodaphone’s 45% share of Verizon Wireless.

Although most see Verizon as simply a service provider, their subsidiaries are extensive and give them a broader reach that meets the eye. Two companies that stand alone from Verizon’s usual business ventures are AOL and The Huffington Post. AOL is a media company and news source that provides email services along with other things, and The Huffington Post is a liberal online-exclusive news source that comes out of New York City. Some other ventures of note include Verizon Fios, which is an internet, television, and phone bundle for private residences, and Verizon Business, which provides a similar service, except in this case to small businesses.

AT&T and Verizon stand atop the competition for mobile carriers, far surpassing the likes of  Sprint and T-Mobile. The race for the most subscribers has gone up and down over the years, however Verizon has recently peaked over AT&T in the number of people using their service. And, despite the fact AT&T have always created more revenue from the services than any competitor, Verizon has been slowly catching up to the competition coming in at only a little over a billion dollars below AT&T last year. Although AT&T claims a faster network, Verizon has far better coverage, as they are a better provider throughout America with less bad spots in their coverage.

Currently, one of Verizon’s largest issues has been protesting. Last week 36,000 workers walked off the job after their was a failure to reach a labor agreement. It’s currently the largest strike since Verizon workers walked off the job in 2011. Luckily for the company a lot of the employees on strike work for the landline providers as well as there Fios broadband network. This won’t have as large of an impact on the financial standing of the company, being that the largest stake of the company, Verizon Wireless, is left relatively unaffected by the issues brought on by the strike. The union on strike, the Communications Workers of America, is working to get a better contract offer for their workers, who have gone without one since August. Most of the issue the union has with Verizon lies within the characters they’re currently employing. Verizon has started outsourcing for a lot of their jobs: around 5,000 jobs have been giving to workers in second and third world countries such as Mexico, the Philippines, and the Dominican Republic. These workers will work for far lower wages and are non-unionized. Verizon is also apparently asking their employees to work out of state for often months at a time. Despite the claim that Verizon is cutting costs to increase its already growing profits, most of these profits are coming from it’s wireless service, which these employees have no part in whatsoever.

This issue has factored into the race for the 2016 Democratic nomination heavily. Both Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton have voiced their support to the protestors, but both have different stakes in the situation. Verizon has been a huge supporter of the Clinton campaign. She’s received tens of thousands of dollars in support for her campaign. In May of 2013, she was payed $225,000 to give a speech, along with between $100,000 to $250,000 given to the Clinton foundation. Clinton did come with a statement in support of Verizon and the strikers reaching an agreement, but came off as ingenue and paled to the support of her rival. Sanders, on the other hand, has been continuously attacking the company in support of the strikers. He was most recently found marching alongside the strikers, and making heartfelt speeches on their behalf. In a recent speech, he called out Verizon as being “one of the largest, most profitable corporations in this country” and further attacked it on blatantly not supporting it’s workers. He promised that he would continue to stand behind the strikers throughout his campaign until a fair contract is reached by both parties involved.

As far as quarter 1 has gone for Verizon in 2016, they’ve surpassed already lofty expectations. Verizon was able to beat all four quarterly estimates of 2015, and seems to be carrying the trend into 2016. Although they only beat the Wall Street quarterly estimate by 0.5%, even exceeding expectations slightly is a huge gain. Their projections had them doing better than they had all of last year, so this is seen a victory.

One of the biggest stories of recent is Verizon’s current bidding war for the tech giant Yahoo. Among competitors to absorb Yahoo are Verizon’s rival AT&T, Google’s parent company, Alphabet, and the former partner of AOL, Time Inc.. Verizon’s goal would be to merge Yahoo into AOL in a way that would be one of the largest platforms for online advertising, rivaling the likes of Facebook and even Google. AOL CEO Tim Armstrong is the one administering the possibility of acquiring Yahoo, with him and Marni Walden, current Verizon Executive Vice President, operating the would be combination. Verizon is willing to even take on Yahoo’s Japanese assets, a project that has been perpetually losing money since it’s inceptions. Despite the fact that the company has had major issues as of late, Verizon sees Yahoo’s business to be worth around 8 billion dollars.

Works Cited

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“Hillary Clinton Rakes in Verizon Cash While Bernie Sanders Supports Company’s Striking Workers.” Saloncom RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Apr. 2016. <http://www.salon.com/2016/04/13/hillary_clinton_rakes_in_verizon_cash_while_bernie_sanders_supports_companys_striking_workers/>.

“Lowell C. McAdam.” – CEO. N.p., 12 June 2014. Web. 28 Apr. 2016. <http://www.verizon.com/about/our-company/lowell-c-mcadam>.

This Is the Largest Strike in the United States since Verizon Workers Last Walked off the Job in 2011. “36,000 Verizon Workers Go on Strike.” CNNMoney. Cable News Network, n.d. Web. 28 Apr. 2016. <http://money.cnn.com/2016/04/13/technology/verizon-strike/>.

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“Verizon Has AOL Chief Tim Armstrong Looking into a Yahoo Acquisition.” The Verge. N.p., 08 Feb. 2016. Web. 28 Apr. 2016. <http://www.theverge.com/2016/2/8/10939526/verizon-yahoo-acquisition-aol-tim-armstrong>.