[1st-mile-nm] CenturyLink CFO Outlines Four Key Growth Areas

[Richard Lowenberg]

This posting is for CenturyLinks entire service area, not just NM.   RL


CenturyLink CFO Outlines Four Key Growth Areas

8/14/13
by Joan Engebretson

http://www.telecompetitor.com/centurylink-cfo-outlines-four-key-growth-areas/

CenturyLink sees its future in four key growth areas, said Stewart 
Ewing, executive vice president and chief financial officer for the 
company at the Oppenheimer Technology, Internet & Communications 
Conference today. Those four areas, he said, are the company’s paid 
video offering PrismTV,  fiber-to-the-tower to support wireless 
carriers’ burgeoning demand for bandwidth, broadband expansion and data 
hosting/ cloud.

Moving forward the company sees revenues from these areas replacing the 
revenues the company is losing from its traditional voice business. As 
an Oppenheimer exec noted, the new growth areas are likely to have 
narrower margins than CenturyLink’s traditional business. But Ewing said 
the company aims to boost margins by emphasizing sales to customers that 
can be served over the company’s own network facilities.

Some highlights from each of CenturyLink’s key focus areas.

The company saw 10% growth in PrismTV subscribers in the second quarter 
of 2013. The company eventually expects to see a 9% take rate in areas 
where the offering is available. The vast majority (97%) also take 
high-speed Internet service – and half of new customers are new to 
CenturyLink, either because they came from a competitor or because they 
moved into the service area.

On the fiber-to-the-tower front, CenturyLink completed more than 1,150 
builds in second quarter and is on track to do between 4,000 and 5,000 
builds before year-end, Ewing said. He noted that the company aims to 
design fiber-to-the-tower routes so that businesses and residences also 
can benefit from the new fiber.

Overall one third of CenturyLink customers can get broadband at speeds 
of 20 Mbps or more. The company is upgrading a traditional cable system 
in Omaha with fiber-to-the-home – a choice Ewing said was less costly 
than a cable or fiber-to-the-node approach.

On the data center/ hosting side, CenturyLink now has 55 data centers, 
some acquired when the company purchased Savvis.  Thirty percent of 
sales on the Savvis side are to existing CenturyLink customers and that 
should help make them more “sticky,” Ewing said.

“We’re using the data center business to maximize the value of our 
national and international network,” said Ewing.



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Richard Lowenberg, Executive Dir.
1st-Mile Institute, 505-603-5200
P.O.Box 8001, Santa Fe, NM 87504
www.1st-mile.org  rl at 1st-mile.org
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