Who did Verizon merge with?
To grow its cellular and landline telecoms activities, Verizon Communications Inc. has merged and acquired companies Among the main mergers and acquisitions involving Verizon are.
AOL-Verizon Merger:
Verizon bought AOL, the online content and advertising company in January, for $4.4bn in 2015. The merger provided Verizon with AOL’s advertising technology and content in addition to its media properties like Huffington Post, Tech Crunch, Engadget, and Map Quest. This has aided Verizon to shift into digital media & advertising besides connectivity to achieve its expansion plans.
Yahoo-Verizon Merger:
In 2017 Verizon paid $4.48 billion for Yahoo's running operations. This made Verizon the owner of Yahoo's assets including the search engine, Yahoo Mail, Yahoo News, Yahoo Finance, and Yahoo Sports as well as ad-serving technologies. The combination was supposed to boost Verizon's digital media and advertising capability so it may challenge Google and Facebook. But when Verizon bought Yahoo, it recorded almost the whole value of the deal.
Alltel Merger:
2009 saw Verizon Wireless and Alltel Corporation team together in a $5.9 billion agreement. Among the biggest cellular companies in the country, Alltel mostly focused on rural areas. With the addition of over 12 million consumers, the acquisition let Verizon cover 34 states and made Verizon Wireless the biggest cell phone business in the nation at the time.
Fleet Call/Cellular One Merger:
Verizon merged with Price Communications in 2000, which provided service under the names of Fleet Call and Cellular One in several regions of the United States. This $2.1 billion merger helped Verizon Wireless gain approximately 500000 customers in six different states. It extended Verizon’s CDMA digital network to new markets as well as new markets within rural regions.
GTE Merger:
Perhaps one of Verizon’s largest and most influential mergers was with GTE in 2000, a $52.3 billion deal. GTE also ran telephone networks that provided local telephone, internet service, broadband, and networking services. The merger also shaped the Verizon Communications company of today by integrating GTE’s local telephone businesses with Bell Atlantic’s East Coast wireless, long-distance, and international businesses.
MCI Merger Attempt:
In 2005, Verizon aimed to buy long-distance phone firm MCI for £5 billion ($6.7 billion). However, the merger was called off in 2002 after a proposal from Qwest Communications topped the purchase. Verizon had hoped to boost Internet and networking service revenues by leveraging MCI's business consumers.
Tracfone Acquisition:
Verizon said in 2021 that it had closed a deal for a maximum of $6.9 billion to buy Tracfone cellphone, a no-contract prepaid cellphone company. With almost 21 million customers, Verizon's purchase is likely to help it raise its market share in the value cellular sector. Early 2023 finds the acquisition still seeking regulatory clearance.
Altogether, it can be referenced that Verizon has been constantly involved in the acquisition of telecom companies big and small for the past two decades to fuel the growth of wireless subsidiaries, consolidate more customer bases, and enter new segments of digital media and advertising. It has specifically focused its acquisitions on industry titans such as AOL, Yahoo, Alltel Fleet Call, and many other small regional carriers. Some of these mergers and takeovers have shaped Verizon into the wireless and wireline telecom mogul it is in the United States today. Looking into the future, Verizon may have to sustain this approach as it seeks to launch 5G technology and keep up with its rivals.
The M&As have given Verizon essential telecommunications structures, new clients and technology, more spectrum, and markets to develop, to prepare it for the future of connectivity.
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