Thread regarding Verizon Communications Inc. layoffs

@bh
True except Verizon doesn't have a good ai infrastructure to do that

What is your base or what team? There are so many diferent engineering teams...I am in design team. It was 20 percemt

@ez Based on your English grammar I highly doubt you even know what a KPI is.

@at lighten up Francis

@ew I been hearing that bs line for the 32 year I been here. Anyone can be replaced anytime by Anyone off the street and do any job here. I seen it with no problem. I remember the old timers said the same about me beiging off the street and did everything those engineers did and better.

The Network will deteriorate it already is. The knowledge base and experience of long time engineers cannot be replaced.

Dead weight

@b3 AI will have no problem doing cell site work. From design to dispatch for problems. AI has been running data centers and distribution center warehouses. For now. A few people can overlook the AI data for cell sites.

Closer to 20% in tristate. Definitely not 40–60%

@ay 100% correct assessment, and the bigwigs who made all those bad decisions are all multi millionaires, some still drawing a VZ paycheck too! Meanwhile they will try to cut the lower level management and craft, who are just trying to hold the place together with duct tape and crazy glue.

I hate the outsourcing overall but why is engineering and network any different than other groups that have been outsourced. The precedent has been set that poor quality is acceptable (customer service, not following through on sales commitments), why not do the same with the network and save a buck? It su-ks to see our hard work be destroyed, but our leaders have clearly outlined the level of acceptance. Air up those scuba tanks. The ship is sinking.

This is B3. Sorry, meant to write 8 of 20 were fired, leaving 12.

In CARTN, 8 of 12 (40%) fulltime design engineers were fired. Heard it was the same in other regions. Still have 20 contractors supporting the twelve VZ engineers left after the dust settled, but they do not do design, they essentially do grunt work (run plots, data fill, etc.. but still have to understand what is happening though) under the direction of the VZ engineers. Not minimizing the contractors' work, just not the same as design.

As for AI picking up the slack for design, look at the history, complexity, and current status.

No AI has taken over any design functions since the fired employees' last day back in November. No AI design tool training has taken place to use any supposed AI design tools.

Data filling automation has been around forever. What I am calling data filling is choosing from a finite set of numbers to populate a data field where there is not any grey area - the number chosen will work or it won't. When the tools group rolls out new design tool features (data fill), they usually break two or three other functions at the same time. It then takes them weeks/months to fix the design tool. The project management tracking tools are not much better. To add to that, there are VPN issues that keep coming up and making it hard to do any work at all.

As for AI doing design, consider the complexity. Currently, a design engineer is often involved for consultation from the beginning to the end of a project. Some design considerations: The project's purpose (capacity vs coverage, or both), location, center line, antenna choices (beamwidth, gain, size), azimuths, what is going on around the area - other new build and other modification projects and should any of these be reworked in light of the current project's potential impact, traffic patterns, seasonality, landlord issues, new developments (residential/commercial), changes in company direction, and on and on. All while the aforementioned is going on, projects are being cancelled, put on hold, expedited, etc.. The landscape is constantly shifting.

I do not see AI becoming ready to take over or substantially help a cell site design engineer in their role anytime soon.

Verizon did not cut 40% of its design team. The first wave of layoffs—the much-touted “13,000”—wiped out closer to 60% of engineering. Network design and optimization engineers, equipment and construction engineers, real estate specialists, and even members of the AI group were swept aside. This wasn’t trimming fat; it was removing muscle. The damage inflicted may be irreversible.

But don’t panic—by the time “Dan the Con Man” walks away with a $60-million paycheck for a two-year contract, the full consequences still won’t be visible. What’s happening now is preparation for disassembly. Verizon is quietly positioning itself to be carved up—most likely into a “fiber company” and a “wireless company,” spun out as separate entities.

The underlying problem is simple and brutal: Verizon no longer has the capital to build anything meaningful. The clock ran out years ago. The company overpaid spectacularly for spectrum that delivers little value, and doubled down on a series of ill-conceived “investments” that were doomed from day one. BlueJeans is a perfect example—acquired with fanfare, then shut down barely a year later. That’s not strategy; that’s destruction of capital.

Meanwhile, a carefully staged illusion is being sold to investors: Look over here—we cut costs, reduced headcount, and everything is fine. It’s the corporate equivalent of selling a car without an engine. Yes, it’s cheaper—but it’s not going anywhere.

How did Verizon end up here? Ask Hans. Ask the current “dear leader.” Ask every board member who tolerated years of incompetence and what amounts to dereliction of duty to shareholders. Sprint took years to unravel under similar mismanagement—though arguably not from a position this bleak.

Make no mistake: Verizon may not survive this crisis as a single, intact company. And when leadership says, “we must become a scrappier, leaner organization,” understand what that really means. You’ll get the scraps—while they eat the investors’ lunch. The echoes of Ken Lay are hard to ignore.

@am AI will have no problem and AI is the backfill nit contractors. Haven't you listened to anything said

No intention? How much will AI-powered design make up for that kind of cut?