Verizon Has Started Selling Off Its 48 US Data Centres – Report

Verizon Communications Inc has started to auction off its US data centre assets as the firm looks to grab $2.5 billion (£1.7bn) to focus efforts on its core telecommunications business, according to Reuters.

Verizon has a portfolio of 48 colocation data centres, a fleet that makes Verizon around $275 million (£188m) annually, anonymous sources told Reuters.

Terremark data centres

The news comes almost five years after Verizon Communications bought data centre provider Terremark for $1.4 billion (£960m), expanding its hosting and colocation strategy.

The sources said that Citigroup is advising Verizon on the matter. Verizon declined to comment.

A sale would mark the latest step of data centre consolidation in the United States. AT&T has been mulling over a sale of its own data centre assets for a year now, and in November 2015, CenturyLink revealed it was contemplating selling its data centre assets.

In November 2015, it was reported that Verizon was looking into a sale of a larger chunk of its enterprise group, including assets worth up to $10 billion (£6.6bn) from its MCI Communications acquisition and data centre business combined.

Verizon was reportedly in talks with fixed-line telecommunications company CenturyLink earlier this year to buy some of the assets in question but the two could not agree on terms.

Meanwhile, the company made other moves last year aimed at building up its wireless business.

In September Verizon said it would hold field tests of 5G technology as early as next year, holding two pilot tests at its facilities in Massachusetts and San Francisco with the support of Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco, Ericsson, Nokia, Qualcomm and Samsung.

In June 2015 the company completed its acquisition of AOL for $4.4bn in a bid to expand its presence in mobile video and advertising.

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