Earnings Call Transcript
VERIZON COMMUNICATIONS INC (VZ)
Earnings Call Transcript - VZ Q3 2024
Operator, Operator
Good morning. Hello, everybody. Welcome to the Essex House and welcome to our event this morning, and for everybody on the webcast, thank you for listening in. We got a couple of items that I need to cover upfront first. And I'm missing the clicker. Is there a clicker? Okay, there we go. Safe Harbor statement. So, our presentation today contains things about statements that they are forward-looking and contain risks and uncertainties. Those are covered on our website with the Safe Harbor statement. A couple of items. Also, we had some non-GAAP disclosures or non-GAAP items in the presentation. The reconciliations of those are provided on the website. Next slide, please. And one administrative item for today, the camera is going to be focused on the stage during live Q&A. For the folks in the audience ask that you announce your name and your firm when called on for Q&A. With that, we're really excited for the content today. So let me hand it over to Hans and we'll get going. Hans?
Hans Vestberg, CEO
Good morning and welcome to Verizon's Third Quarter Earnings Call and Broadband Update. It's great to see so many of you here, as well as those joining us via webcast. I'll begin by discussing the highlights of the third quarter, followed by some strategic updates, and then Tony will cover the results and capital allocation. Before diving into the quarterly details, I want to acknowledge the hurricanes that have recently impacted the southern part of the country, causing significant damage. Verizon has been dedicated to ensuring our communication services remain operational for public safety and affected communities. Initially, we faced some challenges, particularly related to power, but I commend our team for quickly restoring our networks. This highlights the importance of building resilient networks in the face of natural disasters. Now, regarding our third-quarter performance: I'm wearing a tie today, which signifies positive results. Although 2023 hasn't been the most standout year for me at Verizon, we've made significant progress since then, particularly after mid-year when we began revamping our products. Financially, we achieved a 2.7% growth in wireless service revenue, and I'm proud to report our highest EBITDA ever at $12.5 billion for the quarter. Our team truly deserves recognition for this accomplishment. We continue to generate robust cash flow, reporting $6 billion this quarter, which is a critical measure of our performance. Operationally, we've seen improved balance on the postpaid side with 239,000 net additions. Sampath will provide more details about the consumer segment, but I must say he has excelled in both postpaid and prepaid, where we've turned around performance significantly. On the broadband front, I previously committed to updating you once we reach 4 to 5 million fixed wireless access subscribers, and I am excited to announce that we are already 15 months ahead of our original target related to C-band deployment for fixed wireless access. Our Fios performance has also normalized after a period of challenges, and we are pleased with the progress we're making in broadband overall. Additionally, we've made strides in private networks, securing two deals this quarter, along with others. We're committed to enhancing customer experiences in dense areas through our capabilities. Overall, we feel confident about our full-year financial guidance, and we are seeing solid results, reflected in the midpoint or above on both wireless service revenue and EBITDA for the year. Now, turning to our strategy. We view this as a journey, with well-structured phases. The first phase focused on building the foundation, as many of you may recall our substantial investments in fiber and the Verizon Intelligent Edge Network, which have been essential for our current operations. The consumer connection report in front of you showcases our network's growth of 129% over the last five years, underpinned by these vital investments. In the second phase, we sold the Verizon Media Group, acquired TracFone, which is currently paying off, and secured the C-band—an essential move that has resulted in significant financial success and customer impact. We launched new products like fixed wireless access, myPlan, and myHome, which now serve as a base for our future growth. As we look ahead, we are well-positioned with the right assets, teams, and products. In the past six months, we have implemented various strategic initiatives to reinforce our position as a market leader. Our customer-first offerings have resonated well, and our refreshed brand launched in June is starting to show positive effects. We are also enthusiastic about the Frontier acquisition, which enhances our total addressable market. The recent tower transaction has improved our financial and competitive positioning by providing more predictable costs and opportunities. We announced the acquisition of spectrum from US Cellular, which will add capacity, although it will take time to materialize. We see considerable potential in AI, as it relates to efficiencies in customer care and personalization, as well as opportunities for revenue growth through our compute and mobile edge compute efforts. In summary, we believe we have an unmatched value proposition, combining our top-rated mobility and broadband offerings, and we are now approaching nearly 12 million broadband customers, with fixed wireless access generating substantial revenue since its introduction. Looking to the future, we aim to double our fixed wireless access subscriber targets by 2028, aiming for 8 to 9 million subscribers. Joe will elaborate on our plans for continued capacity building, and we expect to cover over 100 million households by combining our broadband and mobility services. We are focused on sustainable growth in service revenue, EBITDA, and cash flow, which are key measures for our management and Board in driving shareholder value. Now, I will hand it over to Joe Russo to provide more insights on our execution and targets.
Joe Russo, Head of Network
Thank you, Hans. I appreciate it very much. Good morning everyone. I want to start by saying that the network and technology team is very confident in the investments I'll discuss in the next few slides, along with our industry's best engineers, which will continue to deliver the most reliable and highest performing networks for our customers, reaching more Americans across the country. It's easy to make claims about being the largest or fastest, but our focus is on building the best networks. This requires hard work and strategic investments that I will address today, including testing and optimizing our network daily, as well as investing in generators and mobile assets for emergencies. Following Hurricanes Helena and Milton, Verizon's network outperformed the industry, and I'm proud that we were there when our customers, first responders, and businesses needed us most. Before I discuss our broadband plans, I want to congratulate Kyle and Sampath for achieving our fixed wireless access target of 4 million to 5 million 15 months early, which was the result of significant effort from many team members. I'm also proud that we built coverage and capacity ahead of schedule to support that target. Looking ahead, we aim to double our fixed wireless access subscribers and expect to cover an additional 30 million homes over the next four years through our award-winning multipurpose network. We need to take a mobility-first approach, which I'll explain shortly. Our goal is to reach 90 million homes and businesses with fixed wireless access, driven by three main initiatives: the aggressive deployment of C-Band and millimeter wave technology, a new MDU solution that will roll out in 2025 providing up to 1 gig Internet service, and leveraging our extensive small-cell network for enhanced ultra-wideband coverage and capacity by 2028. Now, switching to fiber, I'm looking forward to the upcoming acquisition of Frontier, which will combine two excellent fiber assets. The combined wireline footprint serves about 48 million homes and businesses, with 25 million already served by fiber. With 20 years of fiber deployment experience, we will continue to expand Fios in the new footprint after the acquisition closes. Our pace will depend on profitability, the competitive landscape, and our capital allocation priorities, but I want to make it clear that I aim to bring Fios to between 35 million and 40 million homes nationwide. To summarize our network strategy: we are building a shared multipurpose network with an economy that supports as many profitable connections as possible, centralized on our Intelligent Edge Network, which is grounded in our extensive fiber assets and includes our converged IP core and Verizon Cloud platform, as well as our mobile edge computing platform. This foundation equips us to provide the best networks through two access technologies. The first is the radio access network, where we prioritize mobility to enhance customer experience and discover new revenue streams. The successful deployment of fixed wireless access has proven beneficial, as customers appreciate the product. We anticipate accelerating our ultra-wideband deployment, covering 70% of our planned footprint by year-end and reaching 80% to 90% by the end of next year. We recently launched our fully virtualized 5G core network with standalone and slicing capabilities, and we are the only company in the U.S. operating a virtualized RAN at scale, with 40% of our C-Band sites now virtualized. Regarding our fiber access network, we have been building Fios for around 20 years and plan to pass approximately 500,000 premises this year. Frontier aims to cover 10 million premises by the end of 2026, and we target expanding our Fios build up to 650,000 premises in 2025, potentially growing to over 1 million per year post-acquisition. What excites me most is that after two decades, our Fios business case is improving. Customers increasingly demand high-quality broadband services, resulting in higher penetration rates for new builds compared to previous ones, alongside mobility benefits in churn and ARPU. Additionally, we are finding innovative ways to reduce fiber deployment costs through partnerships with companies like Corning and CommScope, which help minimize the amount of fiber needed and streamline the deployment processes. We've also made significant improvements to systems and tools over the years, leading to efficiencies and reduced rework for network operations. We've strategically eliminated legacy costs without needing to deploy fiber too extensively. Our clear goal is to build and operate the best, most reliable network to enhance how our customers live, work, and play. I aim to ensure more Americans have access to this quality network experience by expanding our mobile and broadband networks through careful capital management. This includes a 5G ultra-wideband network serving over 300 million Americans with advanced features for current and future technologies, along with a fixed wireless access and Fios network for over 100 million homes and businesses. Now, I'll pass it over to Sampath, who will discuss how he will ensure more customers gain access to these excellent network experiences. Thank you, Sampath.
Sowmyanarayan Sampath, CRO
Thank you, Joe. Good morning, everyone. I'm excited about two points Joe highlighted. First, our wireless network in America is growing and improving. Second, we have the potential to provide broadband to 100 million homes and businesses over time. Let’s discuss our strategy for achieving this. Verizon is uniquely positioned with two growth engines: mobility and broadband. Both sectors are experiencing significant demand, and Verizon is well-placed for growth. Starting with mobility, we're number one in market share and revenue, especially in our postpaid business, which continues to gain momentum. This quarter marks the seventh consecutive year-on-year growth in postpaid phone gross adds. Our success can be attributed to revitalizing our sales strategy with local structures and incentives, along with the positive reception of myPlan, which customers appreciate for its unique offerings. This quarter, we saw strong performance with 81,000 phone net additions. We aim to maintain a positive trajectory this year. Turning to our value or prepaid segment, the integration of TracFone has generated strong growth, with 80,000 net additions this quarter, the highest in many periods. This success is driven by our brand performance, expansion in exclusive partnerships like Total Wireless, and strong presence in retail, particularly Walmart. Now, regarding churn, with our postpaid strategy functioning effectively and our value transformation underway, I can focus on retention. There’s nothing fundamentally stopping Verizon from being a leader in retention and reducing churn. We have experience in this area and understand how to improve it. In the short term, we’ve made some strategic decisions that might influence churn, but overall, we feel confident in our approach. We are judicious with our retention spending, aligning promotions with customer demand and their specific plans. Going forward, we expect lower churn due to factors like enhanced customer experiences through AI applications in stores and call centers, the positive impact of myPlan and its perks, the benefits of our loyalty program, and the integration of mobile and home services, which significantly lowers churn rates. Additionally, we are focusing on margin-accretive add-on services and maintaining the sales momentum in our broadband services similar to mobility. The launch of MyHome has been successful, with customers enjoying perks that can be shared between mobile and home connections. Our objective is to achieve a balanced service revenue mix through sustainable subscription practices, aiming for an 80-20 revenue share. We believe we have a unique advantage as the only carrier with both fixed wireless access and fiber capabilities, providing coverage to 100 million homes and businesses. FWA is evolving, with coverage expanding from 60 million to 90 million homes and businesses, targeting a high-quality customer base with strong NPS scores. Our pricing strategy is straightforward, avoiding sudden price changes that frustrate customers. With fiber, we’ve leveraged two decades of experience, constantly improving our service and enjoying high customer satisfaction. Our convergence model fosters revenue growth. We project that over 40% of our customers will embrace this convergence, which will enhance our market share. Moreover, we anticipate that bundling mobility with fiber will significantly reduce churn, offering substantial benefits. Ultimately, we are developing one of the leading broadband services globally while focusing on customer demand. Our value propositions stem from our connectivity, with best-in-class network reliability and the services we offer. Our perks, available exclusively to Verizon customers, are a significant revenue stream, which we plan to double in a couple of years. This exclusivity is paired with our loyalty program, offering unique experiences to our customers. In conclusion, we have two robust growth engines and a solid opportunity for market expansion. Our convergence strategy, which is driven by customer demand, will offer transparent pricing and a diverse array of services. We believe in deepening our customer relationships while creating value for both them and ourselves. Our performance over the last seven quarters should provide confidence in our ability to execute our strategy effectively. I’ll now hand it over to Tony for an update on Q3 and capital allocation.
Tony Skiadas, CFO
Thanks, Sampath and good morning. So our execution, as Sampath said is really strong, and it's fueling the momentum in our business. Our third quarter results, before we get into it, I do want to talk about the third quarter. Our ability to demonstrate customer growth and financial growth once again is a hallmark of our testament to execution day in and day out. And we delivered the highest ever reported adjusted EBITDA in our quarter. We're on track, as Hans mentioned, with our 2024 guidance, and at/or above the midpoint of our guided range for both wireless service revenue and adjusted EBITDA. If I go to the operational metrics from mobility, if you think about business and consumer, gross add and churn both improved year-over-year and that drove phone net adds of 239,000 in the third quarter. That's a significant improvement year-over-year. And as Sampath mentioned, we expect the consumer business to have positive postpaid phone net adds for the full year, and that's with and without the second number offering. And that's in addition to the continued strength in phone net adds from our business segment, and that's quarter after quarter of strong growth. If you think about broadband, we have almost 12 million subscribers in our base, and Fios and FWA are both growing. On broadband, we had 389,000 net adds in the quarter. That's another strong quarter for us. And inside of that, if you think about FWA, we've grown our FWA subscriber base over 1.5 million in that time period. And as you heard from the team today, there's much more opportunity for us to expand further. If we move to the financials, Hans talked about how we're measured, service revenue, EBITDA and free cash flow. If I start with service revenue, our service revenue is very healthy. Our wireless service revenue was up 3.1% year-to-date or $1.8 billion. Our EBITDA continues to be strong. And even in a quarter where we delivered a very strong $12.5 billion of adjusted EBITDA, we took actions around revenue and cost efficiencies to set us up for 2025. That strong EBITDA led to free cash flow of $14.5 billion year-to-date, and that's consistent with the prior year. And that includes an increase of $2.5 billion in cash taxes. The cash generation of the business continues to be very strong, and we have ample flexibility and funding to execute on our capital allocation priorities. The business is performing well, and we have good momentum as we close 2024 and head into 2025. And if I shift over to capital allocation, as many of you know, we have four capital allocation priorities and they remain unchanged. Our first capital allocation priority is to invest in the business. And that includes investments in our network infrastructure. If you think about C-Band, if you think about Fios, it includes M&A to accelerate our strategy. If you think about the pending acquisition of Frontier, and it also includes being opportunistic with wireless spectrum as evidenced by the deal we signed last week with US Cellular. As we said before, we're back to BAU levels of capital spend, and we're on track with our 2024 capital program. If we look ahead to 2025 in terms of guidance for 2025, we expect 2025 capital expenditures to be in the range of $17.5 billion to $18.5 billion for the next year. And that's an all-in number that includes all of our growth initiatives. So that includes C-Band and the continuation of rolling out C-Band. Joe talked about having 80% to 90% of our sites on C-Band by the end of 2025. It includes our Fios continued open-for-sale expansion up to 650,000 new open for sale on Fios. And it includes the broadband MDU solution, the multi-dwelling solution that Joe mentioned. All of these things are included in that 17.5 to 18.5 number. And that range gives us the flexibility to both invest for growth and be disciplined and efficient with our capital spend. Our second priority is our commitment to the dividend. And as you've seen recently, we've raised dividend for the 18th consecutive year. That's an accomplishment we're extremely proud of. And as we said many times, our goal is to put the Board in a position for further dividend increases. Our third capital allocation priority is having a strong balance sheet. We've made significant progress deleveraging the balance sheet since the acquisition of C-Band. As of the end of the third quarter, our unsecured leverage stands at 2.50 times. That's the ratio of net unsecured debt to adjusted EBITDA. Our focus is to continue to pay down debt between now and the closing of the Frontier deal. And today, we're announcing an update to our long-term leverage target of 2.0 to 2.25 times. Given our cash flows and overall financial strength, this is the appropriate range for our business to provide flexibility to invest for growth and return capital to shareholders. Our fourth capital allocation priority is share buybacks. And as we've said many times, we will consider share buybacks but our unsecured leverage metric reaches 2.25 times, and that target is unchanged. As we work towards that target, we continue to focus on generating strong cash flows and paying down debt. Our capital allocation strategy is disciplined and deliberate. And as you've seen from our track record, we'll continue to focus on operational execution and performance and deliver on our commitments. We're excited about the opportunities we have ahead. And with that, I'll turn it back to Hans.
Hans Vestberg, CEO
Thank you, Tony. Let me summarize updates before we come to Q&A. I think you hopefully got a feeling that we are setting us up well for 2025 and beyond to continue the leadership in this market and extend it. So we talked about the networks that we're building. It should be the best and the best performing. I think that's been a focus. And really now with the C-Band coming quickly and our Fios build-out, we feel really good about it. It's been important for us to focus the last couple of years on the differentiated value proposition for our customers. We know that there are more important services than ever. To have mobility and broadband is a necessity for every organization, every person on this planet and in the United States. The differentiating offerings that we're doing are enormously important, and they come from deep research what our customer really wants. And of course, together with a refreshed brand should support us for the continuation. Tony talked about capital allocation, and you have seen us being very prudent by the capital allocation. We promised to come down to BAU levels, we're on BAU levels. We have the high cash flow where we saw a great opportunity to quickly come out with that, and that was coming down. We're now doing investment to expand our total addressable market with the same offering, the same network. That's the strategy we have. We stay there and we see that we can continue to grow well and continue to create profitability and cash flow. So that's the overall strategy. And we are measured on three things: the wireless service revenue, the adjusted EBITDA and the cash flow. And we are very committed, the whole team here to continue to grow the service revenue and expand the EBITDA and cash flow going into 2025 and onwards with the investments we're doing right now and where we stand with our strategy, where we stand with our assets and we stand with our offering. So all in all, we feel very positive where we are right now. We feel positive where the market is and our products. By that, I'm going to close, and we're going to have an open Q&A. Brady will help us to manage that. I have my whole management team here, and we even have a pictures on them, if you don't know who they are. They are sitting to the left here for the ones on the webcast. You can see them here. So they are all here. So I'm going to diligently distribute answers to them. Probably going to take some myself. Any questions you might have for us. Brady going to do it, remember, present yourself when you're going to answer, so the webcast audience know who is asking the question.
Operator, Operator
Okay. So I love the folks in the front row, but we're going to go back right to start with Simon. And again, just please announce your name and firm since you're not on the camera.
Simon Flannery, Analyst
Great. Thanks very much. Simon Flannery, Morgan Stanley. Hans, I was interested in your latest thoughts on the BEAD program. You're clearly leaning into broadband. We're starting to see some of the states open up their processes. So how do you think about that as an opportunity beyond this? And then the other question would be around these markets like the Northeast where you have fixed wireless and fiber. How do you start to bifurcate that opportunity? Because I think in the past, if you had fiber, you hadn't really done fixed wireless. But does that start to blend a bit?
Hans Vestberg, CEO
I'm going to start off and then get some help from Joe later. The BEAD program is definitely a key focus for us. In our Fios footprint, we plan to pursue it when it makes sense from an investment perspective. There will be significant opportunities for us in that area, and we will be proactive. Regarding fiber or Fios compared to fixed wireless access, Joe has shared our strategy on fixed wireless access as a secondary approach to mobility. Our primary focus is deploying our C-Band for mobility. Joe and I, along with the whole team, agree that we are building mobility for two main reasons: generating revenue and enhancing customer satisfaction. Following this, we have the opportunity to consider fixed wireless access. We don’t see it as a choice between Fios or fixed wireless; we pursue both Fios and mobility, creating new opportunities. I believe in what we are doing because we provide choices for our customers. Some customers are eager for Fios, while others prefer fixed wireless access due to its simplicity. We intend to provide these options. You may have seen the consumer slide that Sampath presented, showing our customer offering framework, where everything is integrated, no matter what it entails. That's our perspective on it. Joe, do you have anything to add? Please come up if you do.
Joe Russo, Head of Network
Okay. Yeah. Just on BEAD. So we've built a very good process for managing subsidies. And we've been already receiving and winning subsidies in our Fios footprint. So as BEAD starts to get deployed, we'll deploy those same kind of standards and processes to participate. When I think about the 35 million to 40 million, it will be a very, very small percent that we think is BEAD. And we foresee that getting 35 million to 40 million will be with or without BEAD funding.
Hans Vestberg, CEO
Thank you. Next?
John Hodulik, Analyst
Thank you. I don't think you would see me behind these tall guys. Starting with fixed wireless, I appreciate the new targets. However, based on my calculations, it seems like the growth rate is slowing a bit. Currently, you're achieving about 360,000 per quarter, but it looks like that may drop to under 300,000. I want to confirm if this is what we should expect or if there are different numbers at play. Additionally, the new initiatives are promising. You recorded a 1.7% growth in service revenue this quarter. While I understand you can't provide full guidance for 2025 at this point, can we anticipate an acceleration in service revenue growth from these new initiatives?
Hans Vestberg, CEO
On the future guidance, I'm going to leave that to Tony. On the first question, I'm going to start. I think to some extent, you're right. So think about this, we have had a target to create and get between 350,000 to 400,000 new broadband subscribers every quarter. And I think we've had that, but I'm not sure how many quarters. Sometimes up to 400, sometimes a little bit north of 350. What is happening right now is two things. First of all, the fixed wireless access is going into in a second sort of transformation because the C-Band is not going to suburban and rural. And of course, the opportunity is equally big, but the density is way less. So, we're going to see for a while that OFS, it's going to be a little bit less. And the second one is, as we're ramping up the Fios. You saw that we are doing some 450 to 500, going to 650 is a ramp-up. So, in the short-term, I think you're going to be in the lower end of that 350. And then I think when you see the ramping up of both of them, you're going to see a little bit different. So, I wouldn't say that we have changed anything on the pace. It's just a technicality of how we build right now and how we're ramping up Fios and actually going suburban to rural with our C-Band. So, those are the things. Tony, do you want to talk about guidance 2025 now?
Tony Skiadas, CFO
Sure. Hey John, thanks for the question. So, look, as we said we said this morning, we're on track with our service revenue, and we said we'd be at or above the midpoint on service revenue. If we think about next year, I'm not going to guide on 2025 right now. But in terms of puts and takes, we've taken a lot of actions to position ourselves for sustained growth. So, that includes the P&Q that you heard from Sampath, so volume improvements in pricing, and it also includes fixed wireless access, and you see the great growth that we've seen on fixed wireless access. Prepaid, has now, Sampath mentioned, turned positive. So that's been a headwind this year. We would expect that to start to turn next year. We're still facing headwinds with program amortization. So, those are the puts and takes as we head into next year, and we'll bring it back to you in January.
Dave Barden, Analyst
You don’t have to sound so excited about that Brady. Dave Barden from Bank of America. Thanks Hans. So, if my base case is that the tax regime remains the same. Cash tax is going up. CapEx is going up. Working capital, if the iPhone becomes a bigger thing, it's not going down, it might go up.
Hans Vestberg, CEO
A lot of assumptions here, continue.
Dave Barden, Analyst
Those are not so much assumptions. And then you're going to do the Frontier deal, and they're not free cash flow positive. So, is the message financially to you and Tony that 2024 is the high watermark for free cash flow at Verizon because it doesn't seem like there's a lot of options to improve it significantly? And the second question, if I could, is there are some parties at Frontier that want you to pay a higher price, effectively bidding against yourselves in that process. You mentioned the importance of reaching 100 million homes passed and the Verizon version of convergence. What are you willing to do to finalize that deal?
Hans Vestberg, CEO
I’ll leave the capital allocation discussion to you, but it's important to note that while there can always be challenges, there are also positive factors contributing to cash flow, and we will keep our focus on that. I'll let Tony elaborate on the various aspects. Regarding the Frontier deal, as you may have seen in the proxy, it was a competitive process. We were requested to provide our best offer, which we did, and we have a signed agreement for the merger. The next step is for Frontier's shareholders to cast their votes. We have diverse strategies in place and will maintain that approach. This deal aligns well with our current strategy. We'll monitor the situation, but we are confident it is fair and beneficial for all stakeholders. Tony?
Tony Skiadas, CFO
Hey Dave, we won't be providing guidance on free cash flow, but a few points are worth mentioning. The same factors we discussed at the start of the year are still relevant. We see growth in EBITDA, which will be our focus for next year. As for interest and deleveraging, we'll need to monitor where rates are headed, as that will have an effect. Regarding cash taxes, as you pointed out, they have increased this year, and we’ll need to see how the legislative situation unfolds. So far, we mentioned they’ll be around $2.5 billion this year; we’ll observe how that develops. In terms of working capital, we aren't experiencing a significant upgrade cycle at the moment. Upgrades are down by 10%, and customers are choosing to keep their phones longer, which is a deliberate choice. The average upgrade period is around 40 months, which hasn't changed. We will maintain a disciplined and segmented approach and will provide our thoughts on cash flow again in January. Thanks.
Tim Horan, Analyst
Thank you. Tim Horan, Oppenheimer. We're observing significant advancements in technology overall, including satellite and AI, which are noteworthy. Can these advancements become substantial contributors to the business model? Additionally, could you discuss the potential for incremental revenue from these technologies and the role of AI in automating and digitizing processes? Specifically, regarding satellite service directly to phones or mobile devices, could this be a significant factor in driving overall growth rates for the company?
Hans Vestberg, CEO
I think AI is definitely over a time frame. So how Kyle and I think about AI, generative AI especially, in the beginning right now, we see large language models going to the big data centers out to the market all the time. As soon as they're going to be an application that you're going to use as an enterprise, you're going to put it much closer. For the main reason of the transport cost for privacy, for security and in some cases, also latency, maybe not equally much. But then you're going to see a big opportunity for us, given what Kyle talked about. And we will come back a little bit more specific on it, but definitely. But it's going to take some time from all these large language models to be real products and sitting in the edge of the network. So that's clear. Slicing is another area we talked about. We believe that we will probably start more on the business side and then we'll come to the consumer side and that we see as an opportunity as well. On the satellite, a little bit too early to see how large opportunity can be, I have to say, because, of course, we want to offer satellite to our customers in the white spaces, we are not allowed to build, for example, and see a direct device. A little bit too early on the consumer side to see if that's a business case. On the business side, yes, we can see that already for remote enterprise or things like that. So those three are new revenue opportunities on top of everything we've talked about in.
Operator, Operator
Okay. We're going to go over here. We're going to go Brandon, and then Mike Rollins.
Brandon Nispel, Analyst
Thanks. Brandon Nispel with KeyBanc. I was hoping you could maybe unpack the fixed wireless targets in the homes passed from the perspective of maybe a proportion of MDUs versus single-family, Tier 1, Tier 2, Tier 3 markets and percentage of millimeter wave versus C-Band?
Hans Vestberg, CEO
That's quite a bit to cover. I'm not sure if Joe wants to take this, but as I mentioned earlier, the C-Band deployment focuses on suburban and rural areas because we initially started in urban regions due to having access to the spectrum there first. This creates another opportunity, though it has less density. The MDU is enhancing our return to some densely populated areas where we can implement the MDU solution. So, it's a mix of various factors. I don't think there's anything particularly unique about the distribution; we simply deploy our technology from a mobility perspective and capitalize on the surrounding opportunities. Notably, there isn't a success-based capital expenditure for fixed wireless access that comes along with our other initiatives. However, it represents a solid investment. Mobility is seeing improved performance with C-Band, both in terms of churn and customer upgrades, and the same applies to fixed wireless access. It makes sense for us to deploy it strategically where we can generate revenue, which is what Joe is focused on. Is there anything else you would like to add? If not, I understand the question. We have a structured approach and our deployment plan aligns with that. Both Kyle and Sampath are actively selling into the available opportunities that arise from either MDUs or the C-Band deployment.