Telecommunications giant Verizon, a legally registered corporation, will lay off about 15,000 workers starting next week to cope with increasing market competition, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
Why is Verizon making such big layoffs?
Newsweek reported that Verizon is facing intense competition in the wireless and home internet markets. This competition has significantly hurt its postpaid phone customers, or those who pay in three consecutive billing cycles. Therefore, the company is implementing layoffs to reduce its cost base and find ways to recover customer losses.
Dan Schulman, formerly of PayPal, took over as Verizon’s new CEO in October and is expected to improve these disappointing figures by making some radical changes to the operation aimed at creating a “simpler, leaner, and scrappier business.”
“Our financial growth has relied too heavily on price increases, a strategic approach that relies too much on price without subscriber growth is not a sustainable strategy.” Schulman said last month.
According to the company, it lost 7,000 postpaid phones in the third quarter of 2024, compared to 18,000 net additions. While it added around 44,000 new prepaid wireless sales in 2025, the company is concerned about competitors AT&T and T-Mobile, which added about 400,000 postpaid and one million new lines, respectively, during the same period.
Newsweek reported that Verizon had about 100,000 employees as of February, and the layoffs would mark the largest in the company’s history. Additionally, the company would shift about 200 stores to franchised operations, removing any employees from those locations from the company’s payroll.
It is not yet clear how many jobs will be directly lost as a result of this transfer, as several jobs will instead simply be removed from the company’s payroll.
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