Verizon Business’ wireless growth gained steam in Q2 2023

As Verizon Business continued to see declines in the wireline side of the unit, wireless continued to make gains during the second quarter.

The telco reported that Verizon's Business revenue was $7.5 billion in the second-quarter of 2023, down 1.9 percent yearly.

Verizon noted that growth in wireless service revenue was “more than offset by lower wireline revenue and wireless equipment revenue.”

Driven by continued net solid additions and pricing actions implemented in recent quarters, business wireless service revenue was $3.4 billion, an increase of 5.3 percent year over year.

Growing demand

Regardless of some weakness on the wireline side, Verizon revealed in its second-quarter earnings call that wireless adoption by businesses continues to ramp up. 

The business reported 308,000 wireless retail postpaid net additions in the second-quarter of 2023, including 144,000 postpaid phone net additions. This was the eighth consecutive quarter that Business reported more than 125,000 postpaid phone net additions.

Verizon Business also sees more of its customers adopt. The business reported 133,000 fixed wireless net additions in the second-quarter of 2023. 

Tony Skiadas, EVP and CFO of Verizon told investors that business customers continue to adopt new mobile and fixed wireless services. 

“We continued to see strong performance in our business segment, both in terms of mobility and FWA subscriber growth,” he said.

Additionally, Verizon saw a boost from an unnamed new government services contract.

“We had a recent government contract win where we took share from two of our competitors at attractive ARPUs,” Skiadas said.

Private wireless opportunities rise
One area that Verizon Business sees potential in for its wireless services is building private wireless networks for business customers.

While still early, Vestberg said the concept is resonating with more customers.

Typically, a customer will start implementing a private wireless network at one location and then move to other areas.

“It usually starts as a Wi-Fi replacement in one factory, and when they see it working, they do it in all factories,” he said. “We have a growing list of new customers adopting this service, representing a new business for us building on the same network investment.”

He added that the private wireless opportunity could bolster the unit.

“I would not expect private wireless to be a billion-dollar business this year, but over time it’s a critical lever for growth in service revenue, and it’s doing even better with enterprises,” Vestberg said. “We now have an ecosystem with devices and integrators, so I am optimistic that we will take more than our fair share in the private wireless network market.”  

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