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Executive summary and one reference remaining

Verizon Company

[Name]

[Institutional Affiliation]
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1. Introduction:

Verizon Wireless is a branched company of the Verizon Communications, which deals

with different wireless telecommunication services, making it the “largest” wireless internet

service provider of the United States of America [ CITATION Gra13 \l 1033 ] with a consumer

population of 131.9 million subscribers spread across 2,330 regions of the United States of

America.

The Verizon communication came into existence on the 3rd of April in 2000 as a result

of a merger between the GTE and Bell Atlantic. This merger, however, was instigated in the year

1999, when Vodafone, a British based telecom industry went into a joint venture with the Bell

Atlantic to set up a wireless communication and service provider. The Verizon wireless started

its operation after 6 months of this joint venture, and the stakeholder of the entire stakes was

divided between the Verizon communication and the Vodafone group with a percentile division

of 55% and 45%. The GTE wireless assets were added in the Verizon wireless services which

made the company one of the largest wireless providers until 2004, when AT&T wireless ranked

top in the list.

The major merging in the Verizon wireless came in the year 2008, when the board of

directors agreed to purchase the Alltel for a total amount of 28.1 million dollars, with a payment

of debt of 22.2 million dollars. This merging concluded in making Verizon wireless to surpass

the AT&T wireless and became one of the largest wireless service providers with an addition of

40,000 customers.

Verizon is one of the two major United States wireless companies that are providing its

customer with the CDMA2000 which is based on the Code Division Multiple access. The
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Verizon wireless provides HSPA+ and GSM protocol service to T-Mobile network to carry out

3G and 4G LTE services to its cellular consumers. Apart from that, the Verizon wireless also

provides gateway access to EV-DO Rev-A, broadband access to the consumers with an average

speed of 2.5 GHz of broadband services to its consumers.

Stakeholder Identification and Value Analysis

The strategy of the Verizon is the customer oriented. The stakeholders of the organization

are divided into two categories, internal and external stakeholders. All the employees of the

organization and all those who are working in the organization are considered as the internal

stakeholders. It also includes the families of the employees. External stakeholders of the Verizon

include the customers who are the major stakeholders, the shareholder of the organization,

Government, public and the environment in which they are operating. The values of the internal

stakeholder which includes employees are having the value of honesty and respect, whereas

external stakeholder value includes provision of good environment, law obedience, and the

customers’ value includes the value, honesty[ CITATION Ree90 \l 1033 ]. These values of internal

and external stake holders are linked with the value of the organization, which are the integrity

and respect. They are also investing in provision of healthcare services to the society.

Mission Statement

“As a leader in communications, Verizon's mission is to enable people and businesses to

communicate with each other. We are also committed to providing full and open communication

with our customers, employees and investors.”

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Vision Statement

“For our Core Goals, we decided on just one: To create the most respected brand in

communication.”

The organizational culture of the Verizon is the based on four principles including

integrity, respect, excellence and accountability. The organization major focus is on fulfilling all

the promises which they made in the promotional campaign. They also respect the employees

and the values of the customers. They provide the opportunity of learning to employees by

creating or starting training programs. They respect the talented employees and also attract the

talent by offering them handsome employee package to maintain excellence. Verizon

organization is taking responsibility in creating awareness in the employees.

General Forces Analysis

Verizon is a market leader in the communication industry, the environment in which they

are operating is quite feasible, as its business is based in the United States, and the economic

conditions of the country is in favor of the Verizon. The economy is strong which represent that

the customer has buying power. The performance of the Verizon is based on the technology and

the technological position of the U.S. is quite better. This condition of technology has made

enable the Verizon to achieve competitive advantage. As the value of the Verizon is integrity and

respect and their customers are satisfied and feel proud in using the Verizon services, so they do

not have much impact on the Verizon[CITATION Tof \l 1033 ]. The political condition of the United

State is stable and the Government is making the strategies to promote the business. Verizon has

made a tremendous growth by providing the quality products and they are also investing in the
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protection of the environment, they have introduced the green program, as well as they are also

contributing in health care sector.

Porter Five forces model

All the five factors of the Porter model help the organizations to see the opportunities and

the nature of the competition in the market or industry. All the organization operating in the

industries specially the leaders of the market like Verizon in the wireless industry, are engaged in

managing the five forces of porter model, which includes bargaining power of the customers,

bargaining power of the suppliers, threat of new entrants in the market, threat from the substitute

products and rivalry in market[ CITATION Con01 \l 1033 ].

Bargaining power of Customer

In the wireless industry buyer power due to availability of the number of options

available in the market, though Verizon is a market leader but still they have a number of

supplier s in the market like T-Mobile, Nextel and so on which are offering the same services.

Verizon can attract customers by providing them high quality device at lower price and best

networks. Verizon is a market leader because of the differentiation strategies which gives the

customers a feeling of confidence and high value.

Bargaining power of the supplier

The bargaining power of the supplier is link with fewer choices of suppliers in the

market. In wireless industry there are a lot of suppliers so they have a high bargaining power, but

Verizon wireless has reduced the power of the supplier through the establishment of firms which
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are continuously engaged in making deals with the suppliers to make the deals at low cost with

maintain quality.

Threat of substitutes

In the communication industry there is high threat of the substitute products and services,

but Verizon is having less threat of the substitutes because of their differentiation strategies.

They have different setups which are engaged in discovering new technologies to differentiate

their products. They have also used the strategy of low cost in the shape of the offering different

packages which hinder the customers in going to other service providers.

Threat of new entrants

Verizon is engaged in differentiation strategy through investment in technology

development. They are enjoying the competitive advantage in the market, as they are the market

leader so they are having a higher threat of the substitute because there may be competitor or

new entrants which can imitate the strategies of Verizon. So Verizon has created number of

barriers for the entrants specifically the development in the technology (IT System).

Rivalry in market

Verizon has introduced their product in almost all area of the industry like wireless

services, cable, broad band and internet. Verizon is facing a competition from all these areas of

communication. In wireless business the main competitors of the Verizon are the T mobile,

AT&T, and Nextel. The main competitor of the Verizon is the AT&T. both are working hard to

compete with each other, having same goals of providing 3G and $G networks. Verizon still

managed to become the leader because of its new technology and innovative products.
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Value chain analysis & relative core competency and resource analysis

Competitor Competitor
Business Process Your Organization
AT&T Sprint
Management  Recruitment and  Largest  Includes small and

training communication third party

holdings in the minorities in

world by revenue workforce

 7th largest

corporation in the

US

 Own more than

2200 stores in the

US
R&D  Wireless devices  Strongest and widest  Develops new and

 Supplier innovation spanning wireless smart innovations

 Market research network in collaboration

 4G network  Constantly changing with different

technological companies like

 Energy management
environment Samsung and HTC
 Open Development
HR  Recruiting in  Employees training

marketing & sales  Employees

and recruiting and incentives

training in
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operations dept.
Procurement  Suppliers’ warranty  Very small physical

and warranty facility, only ten

claims. cash register and a

 Device subsidy service payment

 Supplier promotion machine

 Transportation for

online transactions

and to indirect retail

stores.

 Energy

 Network equipment

and network parts

 Supplier

relationships

 Wireless devices
Inbound logistics  Vw owned stores  No major  Provides wide IT

 Receiving products advancements repair and return

 QA check point introduced facility

 All kinds of IT

appliances

Operations  Wireless network  Limited floor and  IT engineering

Maintaining storage space  IT hardware and

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equipment, building software

out quality 

inspection

 Vw owned stores

and online retail

inventory Mgmt.
Outbound logistics  Distribution  Widespread  Commited to grow

channels availability of  Seeks additional

 Coordinating substitute products opportunities with

shipments to  Slow but steady new suppliers

indirect retail store growth

 Shipments for

online retails
Sales Marketing  Relatively expensive  It has strategic

management  Increase sale to partnership with

 Largest coverage reduce inventory many multinational

 Advanced network  like Cisco, IBM,

and devices Intel, Microsoft

Sales force

 Company stores

 Business needs
Service  Service reps  Individuals targeted  Individual and

 Network support services group wise,

and repairs  targeted services

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The above table shows the strengths and weaknesses of Verizon wireless compare to the

top two competitors. Verizon is strong in its HR, procurement and sales departments as it

provides consumer friendly services on that ground. While the company is weak in its

management department as it recruits and trains their employees while AT&T manages its

departments and production better. Services department of Verizon is also comparatively better

but does not produce impressive outcomes[ CITATION Sab02 \l 1033 ].

SWOT Analysis

The word SWOT is the combination of Strengths of the company, weaknesses of the

company, opportunities in the market and threat faced by the company while competing in the

market.

Strengths

Verizon is having a good reputation in the U.S. because of their excellent coverage of the

network in United States and across the country. Verizon is having a healthy network and they

are also proving the global coverage. They are differentiating their business by giving their

customers high quality services and innovative and new products. Strength of the Verizon is the

packages they offering to customer, providing best devices which includes, smartphones,

iPhones and iPad. They are the largest carrier of the cell phones. Due to competitive advantage

they have created good brand image and recognition in customers eyes resulted in increase in

sales. They have also invested much in the business of fiber optics to make their services better

with FIOS. Efficient workforce is also strength of Verizon which is engaged in building good

relationship with customers and inventing new technology.

Weaknesses
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The major weakness of the Verizon is the high price plans for voice comparatively with

other service providers like Sprint. As they are focusing on the customer services for that they

have provided an option to customer to manage their account online, but it resulted in the

weakness because the management of the account t is not easy or user friendly. Introduction of

unlimited data package is not actually unlimited, which has resulted in the weakness of the

Verizon.

The voice plans of the Verizon wireless is expensive in comparatively with other service

providers. It’s a weakness which needs to be resolved to stay competitive. As Verizon is having a

differentiation strategy under which they introduced the facility of their customers to manage it

even from home, but it resulted in weakness as it’s not user friendly. All the franchises and retail

stores of the Verizon are independent so they are applying the strategies to increase their profit

margins, which has resulted in weakness.

Opportunities

Though Verizon is having a competitive advantage in the market but they should look at

other opportunities to sustain that competitive advantage. They can expand their business by

acquiring small firms in the business these will help in reducing the competition as well. Verizon

is considered a strong brand of communication in the United States; they could also go to other

countries by adopting a strategy of international expansion. They have range of smartphones and

iPhones, by introducing the range of Blackberry phones in their product lines will help them in

increasing their customers. Verizon could also integrate their network with the improvement in

the GPS system. They can also make the quality of calls high with the installation of cell towers.

Threats
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Verizon is a market leader, and the only threat which they are facing is the increase in the

competition of the market.

Organization strategy type analysis and Action Plan

The strategy that Verizon need to be selected is the differentiation. As Verizon is having

a competitive advantage in the industry of wireless communication. To implement the

differentiation strategy they need to bring innovative elements in their operations to bring the

differentiation in the organization. They need to adopt new technology to satisfy the needs and

demands of the growing customers[ CITATION Hal93 \l 1033 ]. As Verizon is the result of the two

big organization of wireless communication, so they need to adopt the new strategies in

provision of high quality services. They could go global by using the international expansion

strategy.

The profits of the firm are huge and it’s growing day by day, so they should start the

operations which will help them in improving their technology and service quality. Customers

are the essence of the communication industry, so to retain or sustain the competitive advantage

they are having they need to provide the customers innovative products, new packages, and to

facilitate them in solving their problems. By doing all these, they could achieve sustain the

competitive advantage. Verizon is the market leader and they have attained this position by

doing all the activities which an organization is required to be successful. As they are having

competitive advantage so there is a chance that large number of competitors can come in the

industry and imitate their strategies to compete. So Verizon needs to differentiate their devices

and services offered by focusing on implementing the best technology, which is not in the access

of the competitors, the second aspect is security[ CITATION Vor05 \l 1033 ].

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In communication industry the most aspect is the security of information so to

differentiate Verizon could invent or made the technology to save the information of the

customers. As most of the customers are facing the problem of dropped calls so they need to

invest or implement new strategy of technology to avoid these kinds of problems. As mentioned

above customers are the essence so they need to fulfill are the requirements of the customers to

make them happy. In communication industry as most of the organizations use the marketing of

brands as a source of revenue so Verizon could eliminate this strategy to provide the customers a

good quality services. As mentioned above customers are the main source of the business

success so they need to deliver the high quality and innovative products and services and through

the provision of after sale services[ CITATION Pfe95 \l 1033 ].

Verizon require setting up the programs or department of research and development to

bring the new technology in providing services to their customers. With the provision of

innovative products and the usage of new technology will help in increasing the customer

confidence in your organization and the y will be loyal customers of the Verizon wireless. They

need to start the training program of the customer to make them aware and guide them for the

usage of the devices[ CITATION Bla94 \l 1033 ]. They need to adopt the creative promotional

campaign to increase in the awareness of the customers. Training sessions and creative

promotional activities will help the Verizon wireless in showing the customers that the

organization cares about them by give them the knowledge about the usage of the mobile phone

in the critical situations.

Conclusion
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We can conclude that the Verizon wireless has achieved the competitive advantage by

adopting the latest technology and through the provision of innovative and high quality products

to their customers. They are having the good position in the communication industry and they

can sustain this position by adopting the differentiation strategy. In this strategy they could start

the program for technological development and with the help of research and development

department they could provide the innovative and creative products to restrict the customers.