The company generated total second-quarter revenues of $5.3 billion, or growth of 0.9 percent compared with last year's second quarter. This is Verizon Business' seventh consecutive quarter of year-over-year pro-forma revenue growth (non-GAAP, calculated as if Verizon and MCI had merged on Jan 1, 2005 and excluding the revenues of the wireline segment's non-strategic local exchange and related business assets in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, spun off on March 31, 2008). Global enterprise revenue, representing retail sales, increased 1.7 percent to $4.0 billion, compared with the year-ago quarter.

Sales of strategic services -- such as IP (Internet protocol) and managed services, including security, as well as Ethernet and optical services -- continued to fuel growth. These services generated nearly $1.5 billion in revenue, up 18.7 percent from second-quarter 2007.

"We continue to see very strong demand for the technologies and services that are fueling the ongoing global IP transformation," said John Killian, president of Verizon Business. "Our combination of capabilities and expertise in providing multinationals with integrated IP and IT solutions is unmatched, and these results show that our customers are getting the message."

Capabilities, Reach Expanded During Quarter

Verizon Business continued during the quarter to introduce new capabilities that support its integrated global solutions strategy.

Moving strategically to address the growing demand from large corporations for high-tech services geared to improving business performance, Verizon Business announced that it is delivering a standardized set of more than 50 professional-service capabilities in 30 countries around the globe. The services -- delivered through 2,700 specially trained and experienced consultants - are focused on five key practice areas: Security Services, IT Services, Network Integration and Engineering, IP Communications, and Contact Center Services.

The company also unveiled significant enhancements to its suite of unified communications (UC) offerings that help multinational companies to collaborate better and improve their business processes, while cutting travel costs. These enhancements included expansion of the company's voice-over-IP (VoIP) portfolio to four additional European countries; international expansion of the company's Integrated Communications Package (ICP) UC offering; integration of ICP with Verizon Conferencing; and deployment of the newest Microsoft Office Live Meeting platform for Verizon Net Conferencing. Additionally, the company rolled out a new software-based version of its PBX Mobile Extension offering that transfers the capabilities of an office phone to a mobile device.

Managed security services also continued to be a key area of focus during the quarter. Verizon Business announced significant enhancements to its Security Management Program, security monitoring and management services for Fortinet's FortiGate unified threat management platform, and additional managed security services aimed at preventing data breaches.

Underscoring the company's leadership in the global security services marketplace, Verizon Business released a first-of-its-kind report spanning four years and more than 500 forensic investigations. The "2008 Data Breach Investigations Report," conducted by Verizon Business Security Solutions investigative experts, found that nearly nine in 10 corporate data breaches could have been prevented had reasonable security measures been in place.

The company also provided additional options for extending Ethernet local area networks (LANs) to new locations, announcing enhanced optical capabilities that enable customers with campus environments to connect directly to associated sites easily and cost effectively with the ease and resiliency of synchronous optical network (SONET) technology.