Verizon lifts subscriber outlook and seals over $2 billion AI fiber pact with AWS

Verizon announced that its third-quarter wireless subscriber increase reached 406,000, far exceeding Visible Alpha’s estimate of 209,439, leading the company to raise its annual post-paid phone subscriber target to between 1.1 million and 1.2 million, up from the previous 750,000-1 million range. The firm also increased its full-year adjusted earnings per share guidance to $5.04-$5.06 from $4.99-$5.04. Despite the subscriber boost, Q3 revenue of $34.3 billion missed the $34.74 billion consensus, pressured by lower device-upgrade volumes as customers held onto phones longer after subsidy cuts.

Under CEO Dan Schulman’s year-long overhaul, Verizon introduced the Simplicity plan with transparent pricing and unlimited data. The company also sealed an AI infrastructure contract worth more than $2 billion with Amazon Web Services, providing high-capacity fiber to AWS data centers for faster AI computing. This follows a July agreement with Google valued at over $1 billion to connect its data centers via dark fiber, highlighting new revenue opportunities beyond traditional telecom services.