Qwest Signs Agreement To Resell Verizon Wireless Service
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I recently had a chance to talk to a manager of one of the Qwest kiosks at a local mall. We discussed, among other things, the state of the wireless industry and how they were getting a raw deal in the wireless resale deal with Sprint. He also mentioned that a resale deal with either AT&T or Verizon was likely.
When I saw the news today that Qwest signed a 5 year resale deal with Verizon Wireless, I can’t say I was surprised. The announcement today didn’t mention anything about what would happen to existing Qwest Wireless customers. Given that Sprint and Verizon Wireless both use CDMA, it should be relatively straightforward to move the existing Qwest Wireless customers over to Verizon–or at least as straightforward as these things get. Update: See what Qwest’s PR folks had to say about this.
Given how buddy-buddy Qwest and Verizon Wireless are getting with this deal, which includes joint bidding on government contracts, and integration of Qwest’s IP network with Verizon Wireless’ network, and shared billing arrangements, I wonder if we might see another attempt by Verizon to purchase Qwest outright.
