- Verizon is buying FWA provider Starry for an undisclosed sum
- Starry serves approximately 100,000 customers across five markets
- Starry, like Verizon, uses millimeter wave spectrum to serve its customers
It's been a bit of a busy week for Verizon. Just days after announcing a surprise CEO transition, the operator is doubling down on fixed wireless access (FWA) growth by acquiring Starry for an undisclosed sum.
The operator said it will leverage Starry’s millimeter wave technology and market presence to bring high-speed internet to more multi-dwelling units (MDUs) and urban communities. Starry currently serves about 100,000 MDU customers across the Boston, Denver, D.C., Los Angeles and New York metro areas.
The acquisition, expected to close by first quarter 2026, will allow Verizon to “accelerate our fixed wireless access capabilities, giving millions of new customers a powerful and affordable broadband option,” said Joe Russo, Verizon’s EVP and President of Global Networks and Technology, in a statement.
Verizon in the second quarter added 278,000 FWA subscribers, bringing its total to over 5 million customers. The operator has said it is trying to reach 8-9 million FWA subscribers by 2028.
The deal is the culmination of a rollercoaster decade for the startup. Founded in 2014, Starry went public in 2022 but six months later was already in hot water. It laid off staff at the end of 2022 and worked its way through a bankruptcy proceeding in 2023. It reemerged a private company once again and in 2024 focused on updating its hardware and software rather than expanding its footprint.
And it seems it is Starry's technology Verizon is after. "This architecture is less expensive to build, quicker to deploy and uniquely addresses the complexities of urban settings where we can leverage our existing fiber and mmWave assets," Russo added.
What the analysts are saying
Recon Analytics Principal Roger Entner told Fierce while the Starry acquisition isn't "material" for Verizon, it's a lifeline for a company that never quite got back on its feet post-bankruptcy.
"Starry was on life support and is flatlining at 100,000 subscribers in five cities," he said.
The deal isn't as big as Verizon's $20 billion Frontier purchase, but Entner thinks it gives Verizon "another arrow in the quiver" to disrupt the MDU market - a segment that's "dominated" by cable companies.
Verizon has talked about using mmWave spectrum for urban FWA deployments for some time now. The operator told Fierce in May it's already deploying radios specifically for FWA service to MDUs, and it can ramp those rollouts with the help of Starry's 60 GHz spectrum, said Mobile Experts Lead Analyst Joe Madden.
"Verizon has millimeter-wave spectrum that it can use in most American cities, but in others Verizon can use Starry’s 60 GHz FWA system to address MDUs and other urban residents," he explained. "The 60 GHz band is unlicensed, so Verizon can use it anywhere."
Starry has "a good architecture" for high-capacity FWA in an urban environment, but it lacked capital for wider deployment, Madden noted.
"It’s difficult to compete nationwide as a small company, as deep pockets are required to build out a network at such a large scale," he added.