Verizon Communications

This not only renders the company, effectively, a regional phone company, but also forces it to pay usage fees to a long-haul carrier such as MCI to complete calls for its customers whenever those calls go outside the Verizon "footprint." That need is obviated by the MCI acquisition. Today, PricewaterhouseCoopers brands its consulting activities through the Advisory name. While it is the largest telecommunications company in the world, the bulk of Verizon's profitable business is concentrated in the eastern United States. The selling of this profitable arm of the firm was a result of public pressure on all the Big Four audit firms, as it is seen to be a conflict of interest for an audit firm to be offering non-audit services to clients. However, the real benefit to Verizon is the acquisition of long-haul lines. In August 2003, IBM revealed that the actual value of the deal was closer to $3.9 billion. Media coverage has focused on several ways in which that acquisition, once completed, will benefit Verizon, including economies of scale derived from a potential productivity boost to be achieved via the elimination of thousands of jobs at the combined company, and access to the large base of business customers currently served by MCI. In October 2002 PricewaterhouseCoopers sold PwC Consulting, its professional consulting arm, to IBM for approximately $3.5 billion in cash and stock.

On February 14, 2005, Verizon agreed to acquire MCI, formerly WorldCom, after SBC Communications agreed to acquire AT&T just a few weeks earlier. These plans were soon revised, however. This service provided by Verizon is entitled "FiOS," and is planned to offer three package levels: 5 Mbit/s downstream / 2 Mbit/s upstream, 15 Mbit/s downstream /2 Mbit/s upstream, and 30 Mbit/s downstream / 5 Mbit/s upstream.^[2] Verizon is currently redirecting most of its local budget cash-flow into FTTP rollout, leaving little money for technician tools and vehicle maintenance. (See also related article on rebranding.). Verizon is currently in the process of deploying and testing FTTP (Fiber To The Premises) to some subscribers. During 2000, rival firm Arthur Andersen had spun off its consulting activities as Accenture. Note this section refers to land lines only, as Verizon Wireless operates nationwide. This unusual branding effort occurred in part as a response to one of the firm's rivals.

In 2005, Verizon sold off GTE's former telephone operations in Hawaii. According to a June 2002 BBC news article, the firm's CEO, Greg Brenneman described the unusual name as "a real word, concise, recognisable, global and the right fit for a company that works hard to deliver results.". In 2002, Verizon sold GTE's former telephone operations in Missouri to CenturyTel. An outside consultancy, Wolf Olins, was hired to create a brand image for the new entity, which was introduced to the public as "Monday". Due to the rigorous climate and high costs, GTE Alaska was sold to Alaska Power and Telephone Company rather than be merged with Verizon. The firm announced in May 2002 that its consulting activities would be spun off as an independent entity. It also provides service to secondary markets (mostly from its acquisition of GTE) in California, Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, South Carolina, Texas, Washington, and Wisconsin. PwC planned to capitalize one these development through either a sale to possible suitors like HP and Microsoft or to spin off the division as a separate company.

The states that it provides service to include northeastern Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, and West Virginia. During the time of the dotcom era, many smaller consultancies capitalized on the tremendous wealth generated in the equity markets. Verizon serves customers throughout much of the United States. The Management Consulting Services (MCS) was one of fastest growing and most profitable areas of the consultancy. As of 2003, it has more than 203,000 employees. Though the firm's core business is accountancy, it also ran a huge professional consulting branch, as did other major accountancy firms. It also has more than 16 million long distance customers. PricewaterhouseCoopers had already decided to sell its technology consulting practice to IBM by this point.

Verizon shares were made a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average on April 8, 2004.^[1] Verizon currently has 140.3 million land lines in service. This forced many of the Big Four to divest their interests in technology consulting. Verizon then became the majority owner (55%) of Verizon Wireless. One such result was the adoption of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, which required auditor independence and separation of internal audit from general consulting. GTE's wireless operations became part of Verizon Wireless—creating what was initially the nation's largest wireless company before Cingular Wireless acquired AT&T Wireless in 2004—when the Bell Atlantic–GTE merger closed nearly three months later. The 2002 indictment of Enron and WorldCom and the subsequent collapse of Arthur Andersen resulted in stringent SEC rules on auditor independence. This wireless joint venture received regulatory approval in six months, and the wireless joint venture began operations as Verizon Wireless on April 4, 2000, kicking off the new "Verizon" brand name. The following year, merger discussions between PwC and Grant Thornton failed.

wireless assets (Bell Atlantic Mobile (which was previously called Bell Atlantic-NYNEX Mobile by 1997), AirTouch Cellular, PrimeCo Personal Communications and AirTouch Paging). In 1998, Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand merged to form PricewaterhouseCoopers. Meanwhile, on September 21, 1999, Bell Atlantic and London-based Vodafone AirTouch Plc (now Vodafone Group Plc) announced that they had agreed to create a new wireless business with a national footprint, a single brand and a common digital technology—composed of Bell Atlantic's and Vodafone's U.S. Coopers & Lybrand lost a majority of its market share in the 1980s when mergers reduced the Big Eight to the Big Six. The Bell Atlantic-GTE merger, priced at more than $52 billion at the time of the announcement, closed nearly two years later, following analysis and approvals by Bell Atlantic and GTE shareowners, 27 state regulatory commissions and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), and clearance from the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) and various international agencies. In the 1970s, Coopers & Lybrand studied ways to incorporate technology into automating the auditing process. The mergers that formed Verizon were among the largest mergers in United States business history, culminating in a definitive merger agreement, dated July 27, 1998, between Bell Atlantic, based in New York City since the merger with NYNEX in 1996, and GTE, which was in the process of moving its headquarters from Stamford, Connecticut, to Irving, Texas. Coopers & Lybrand was essentially an auditing firm.

Its former Canadian subsidiaries have combined with the former Alberta Government Telephones (AGT) to create TELUS, the second largest telecommunications carrier in Canada. & Montgomery and the Cooper Brothers. GTE operated in Canada via controlling interest in subsidiary companies such as BC TEL and Quebec Tel. Coopers & Lybrand, the product of a 1957 merger between Lybrand, Ross Bros. GTE provided local telephone service in a large number of areas of the U.S. The firm benefitted from tough auditing requirements that arose from the Great Depression. They also owned Automatic Electric, a telephone equipment supplier similar in many ways to Western Electric. Price Waterhouse's offices in the United States were open in the 1890s.

It would later merge with the second largest independent, Continental Telephone. By the late 1800s, Price Waterhouse had gained significant recognition as an accounting firm. General Telephone and Electronics (GTE) was the largest of the "independent" telephone companies during the days of the Bell System. A few years later, he took on Edwin Waterhouse as a partner of the firm, leading to the birth of Price Waterhouse. NYNEX was consolidated into this name by 1997. Samuel Price, an accountant, founded the firm in London in 1850. when it merged, it moved to New York City as its main headquarters. PwC's other large clients include American International Group, The Home Depot, Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Tesco and Unilever.

states of New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, West Virginia, and Virginia as well as Washington, DC. PwC also audits four of the 10 largest companies in the United Kingdom (GlaxoSmithKline, Shell, Barclays and Lloyds TSB Group). Until its merger with NYNEX in 1996, Bell Atlantic operated in the U.S. As of March 2005, PricewaterhouseCoopers' audit clients included four of the 10 largest public companies in the United States (Exxon Mobil Corporation, Ford Motor Company, ChevronTexaco and IBM). Bell Atlantic meanwhile, was also created as one of the original RBOCs from the former Bell of Pennsylvania, New Jersey Bell, and Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Companies. The firm's dominant practice is Assurance, which accounts for over 50% of PwC's revenue. The Nynex name was retained after the US parent company's merger with Verizon, before being dropped in 2002 in favor of Gibtelecom, although it is still used colloquially in Gibraltar. Europe and North America account for about 82% of PwC's annual revenue, with Europe alone accounting for 45%.

In Gibraltar, it had a 50 per cent stake in a joint venture with the Government of Gibraltar, called Gibraltar Nynex Communications, also known as GNC or GibNynex. According to statistics compiled by the firm from third party sources, PwC ranks in as the number 1 employer of choice among the Big 4 in student recruiting surveys from 12 countries including China, Germany, United Kingdom and the United States [2]. NYNEX also operated cable TV services in some parts of the UK, although these were later sold to Cable & Wireless, which subsequently sold these to NTL. PricewaterhouseCoopers is one of the top 10 companies for working mothers in 2004 according to Working Mother Media. The origins of this company began as NYNEX, and was created as one of the original Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOCs) in 1984 from New England Telephone & Telegraph and New York Telephone. PwC audits 37 per cent of the FTSE 100; 22 per cent of the FT Asia Pacific 100 and 43% per cent of the Fortune 1000. . The firm also has in-house human resource services and legal services (through its correspondent global legal firm, Landwell).

The name is a portmanteau of the Latin word veritas (meaning truth) and the English word horizon. PwC's service lines are further divided into Consumer and Industrial Products and Service (CIPS), Financial Services (FS) and Technology, Infocomm and Entertainment (TICE). Prior to its transformation into Verizon, Bell Atlantic previously merged with another Bell Operating Company, NYNEX, in 1996. PricewaterhouseCoopers has three main service lines — Tax, Audit and Assurance and Advisory. Verizon Communications With over 10 million customers worldwide, NYSE: VZ is a New York City-based Baby Bell formed by the merger of Bell Atlantic, a former Regional Bell operating company, and GTE, which was the largest independent local-exchange telephone company in the U.S., with presence in most all of the continental United States. DiPiazza Jr, a 45 year old partner of the erstwhile Coopers & Lybrand. For the Mobile Phone Provider, see Verizon Wireless.. The current global CEO is Samuel A.

Qwest. These 'sister' firms are governed by a global board of partners. BellSouth. The legal structure of a partnership is very different to that of a company, and as such the global firm is in fact a collection of member firms, that are run autonomously in their respective jurisdictions. SBC Communications. . MCI. PricewaterhouseCoopers is head quartered in New York City, United States.

AT&T. PwC is one of the Big Four, along with KPMG, Ernst & Young and Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu, and was formed in 1998 from a merger between Price Waterhouse and Coopers & Lybrand. Sprint Nextel Corporation. There are over 120,000 people employed by the global partnership, in 144 countries around the world, working in four lines of service and 22 industry-specialised practices. PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (or PwC) is the largest professional services firm and the 6^th largest private company in the world [1]. Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

Big Four auditors.