Verizon CEO cuts to the chase on new layoffs and AI future:
As a new wave of job cuts hits Verizon, leadership delivers a blunt reality check on future plans and an AI deadline.
May 11, 2026 5:37 PM EDT
Dan Schulman, president and chief executive officer of PayPal Holdings Inc.
Corum/Bloomberg via Getty Images
The leaner era of Verizon Communications has entered a new phase of targeted reductions. On May 7, the company confirmed a new round of workforce cuts that will affect hundreds of employees.
This move arrives less than six months after the company completed a massive 13,000-person reduction, the largest in the telecom provider’s history.
The heaviest impact of these new layoffs is expected to be concentrated at the company headquarters in Basking Ridge, New Jersey.
According to Business Insider, the latest reduction represents approximately 1% of Verizon’s overall headcount.
And while the company has been conservative with specific headcounts, a recent State Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) filing in May confirms that 121 employees at the Basking Ridge headquarters are scheduled to be laid off on August 7, 2026.
Behind these layoffs and the company’s shifting profits lies a larger story of finance and AI-driven infrastructure aimed at improving efficiency.
Verizon’s $5 billion efficiency mandate
The latest workforce reduction follows a transformative milestone for the company. Earlier this year, in January, Verizon finalized its acquisition of Frontier Communications. The $20 billion deal expanded Verizon’s fiber footprint to 31 states.
During the Q1 earnings call, CFO Tony Skiadas also revealed that Verizon is aggressively pursuing an operating expense (OpEx) savings target of $5 billion by the end of 2026.
The telecom provider has also set an ambitious target of $1 billion in operating cost synergies by 2028.
As Verizon absorbs Frontier’s merger and expands its fiber footprint to almost 30 million passings, the company is also prioritizing automation to manage the expanded network, albeit with a smaller human headcount.
“We have begun to see meaningful cost benefits from our transformation efforts as we take out legacy structural costs from the business,” said CEO Dan Schulman during the call.
Skiadas detailed a relentless strategy to permanently remove $5 billion from the company’s annual spend.
“We’re off to a great start on the $5 billion of cost transformation,” Skiadas told analysts.
The strategy is multi-layered:
Workforce reduction: The 13,000-plus layoffs since October 2025 are the primary driver of savings. Skiadas noted the company is “running leaner” and is cutting “third-party contractor and outsource spend” to keep savings in line.
Legacy decommissioning: Verizon is decommissioning old copper network elements, recycling and “monetizing” them by selling scrap metal.
Real estate rationalization: As the workforce shrinks, the company is also reducing its real estate footprint across administrative and network sites.
The most vital aspect of Shulman’s turnaround is the AI tech stack sprint, designed to address customer pain points by automating digital sales and service.
Verizon, through these AI-enabled channels, aims to lower the cost of retention while defending its customer base.
Schulman, who has usually been upfront about AI’s role in the future, told investors that the company is on a timeline that would have been impossible a year ago.
“We are going to be substantially complete with that entire AI tech stack by July, and we hope to be fully done by November,” he said on the call.
To hit this mark, the company has recruited several “AI-savvy individuals” over the last seven months, adding that “we’ve done more in the last three months than we’ve done in the last three to four years around this.”
Verizon’s stock is up 15% year to date.
The Frontier factor and Verizon’s record profits
The May layoffs coincide with Verizon’s most successful quarter in recent years. According to the company’s recent Q1 2026 financial release, Verizon achieved its first positive first quarter “postpaid phone net adds since 2013.”
Its adjusted EPS also rose to $1.28 per share, a 7.6% year-over-year increase.
By integrating Frontier’s fiber network, Verizon expects at least $1 billion in annual cost synergies by 2028. This merger allows Verizon to stop paying third-party access costs and automate its network management, albeit now with a significantly smaller headcount.
Analysts, meanwhile, remain divided. Morgan Stanley recently raised its price target on Verizon to $50 from $40, keeping an equal weight rating. Noting the improving subscriber growth and competitive intensity in wireless was “encouraging,” the firm said.
However, Este Group downgraded Verizon to hold from buy, saying the company’s earnings growth still lags behind the broader sector average, according to TheFly.
As Verizon works to complete its AI tech stack by July, the company’s message is clear that it intends to continue this cost transformation well beyond 2026.
https://www.thestreet.com/employment/verizon-ceo-cuts-to-the-chase-new-layoffs-ai-future