Newsrooms across the country are filled with stories about how big and powerful tech companies are looking to acquire companies that offer services that are not yet available on the web.
Now, a senior Verizon executive has been talking up Google’s potential acquisition of Google, saying the telco could be poised to become the next company to enter the wireless broadband market.
“The fact that we can take that and put it in our devices is going to make it very, very valuable to us,” said Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam.
In a statement, McAdam said the deal could result in a company that could offer “unique and compelling” new services and could be worth “over $5 trillion”.
The company is also looking at a “sustainable and scalable future” as a leader in wireless broadband, McAdams added.
The acquisition is likely to be a big deal for Verizon as Google and other large companies have been aggressively pushing for the technology to become ubiquitous.
Verizon is already offering a number of services to its customers including VoIP, messaging and video calling.
McAdam’s comments come just days after Google announced it had bought Motorola for $12.5 billion, bringing its total assets to $60 billion.
The company said it will also continue to focus on its existing business in mobile phones, which Google has largely dominated for more than a decade.
As part of the deal, Google will continue to be the exclusive provider of voice and video technology for Verizon.
The two companies are expected to continue to work together to build out Google’s wireless broadband business.
Google, meanwhile, said it was working with Verizon to develop new services for its Android operating system.
The deal is expected to be completed in the second half of 2018, Google said.
McAdam’s remarks come amid heightened interest in the smartphone market.
As smartphones become more widely available, Verizon is likely hoping to make inroads into a market where it has traditionally struggled to deliver its services.
Verizon’s shares have fallen in recent months, and its stock is trading at just above $21 per share.
With the deal in place, Verizon will be the only major US carrier to offer its customers the Google services.
Google’s Android operating systems are available for many smartphones, tablets and laptops, but the company’s smartphone products remain restricted to a limited set of apps.
Verizon’s latest acquisition comes as its stock has been falling since McAdam took over the company in December 2016.
After the $13 billion acquisition of Nokia, Verizon has been trying to build its own smartphone business, but McAdam has largely struggled to find a partner to buy the struggling phone company.
This deal is likely seen as a step towards Verizon’s plans to become a leader of the wireless internet.
McAdams also said Verizon is focused on helping its customers have more control over their devices and to improve the quality of their experience.
“Verizon has a number (of) customers that are very disappointed by what they see with their phone,” McAdam told analysts on a conference call.
However, McAdays comments came just days before Verizon and Google announced a deal that would give Google and its Motorola partner access to the vast amount of data the company collects from its users, as well as other data, from Google’s data centres.
Motorola, however, has been more active in the market than Google, with it recently launching its own mobile services.