Verizon Changes Operating Structure Into 3 Areas, Hires Ex-Ericsson CEO

Verizon Communications Inc. said Friday it is changing its operating structure to focus on three areas, media and telematics, network and technology and customer and product operations. As part of the new structure, the telecoms company is hiring former Ericsson Chief Executive Hans Vestberg as executive vice president for the network and technology team. He will initially be based in Sweden and report to Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam. Marni Walden is EVP for media and telematics and John Stratton will head up customer and product operations. The media and telematics business will house the assets of Yahoo, giving Verizon more than 1.3 billion digital media users, generating $7 billion of revenue. The structure "will give us greater organizational agility to continue to lead the market with our wireless and fiber services, scale and expand our media and telematics businesses, and maintain the leadership in network reliability and new technology that is a Verizon trademark," said McAdam. Shares were flat premarket, but are down 8% in the year so far, while the S&P 500 has gained almost 6%.

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