Verizon (VZ) and Amazon have announced that they have now expanded their relationship to offer Verizon customers the 7-piece Ring Alarm Security Kit with Verizon LTE and the Security by Ring plan.
“By combining our leading network with Amazon’s (AMZN) unique products and services, we’re providing premium access, experiences and integrated offers for our customers in entertainment, connectivity and now, home security,” cheered Verizon’s Brian Higgins.
The Ring Alarm Security Kit includes customizable email alerts and push notifications, voice-activated Alexa arming and disarming and automatic arming and disarming with supported smart locks. It also features LTE backup for connectivity in case the home Wi-Fi goes down.
The kit, which comes with a Base Station, Keypad, Range Extender, Motion Detector and three Contact Sensors, costs $229.99. Meanwhile the $10 monthly subscription Security by Ring service includes professional monitoring, cellular backup, and 60-days of video storage.
For a limited time, customers get $50 off the Ring Alarm Security Kit when buying a news smartphone, and $100 off with a new Motorola smartphone.
“Later this fall, Verizon 5G Home customers can take advantage of even more smart home technology with an enhanced Amazon home starter kit. We’ll continue to expand our Amazon relationship to bring customers more options and access to premium content and services” Verizon added.
Shares in VZ are trading down 2% year-to-date, and the stock scores a cautiously optimistic Moderate Buy Street consensus. That’s with analysts evenly split between hold and buy ratings. Their average price target indicates limited upside potential lies ahead, despite the disappointing stock performance so far this year.
Oppenheimer’s Timothy Horan reiterated his Verizon buy rating and $70 price target after the company announced that it plans to acquire Tracfone for $6.9B, including $6.25B equally in cash/stock and $650M in future cash considerations.
“Positively, Verizon is playing offense and continues to focus on its core competency: wireless services” the analyst explained. He believes the network should benefit from greater utilization via upselling wireless products and services as it has been underutilized historically.
According to Horan, the acquisition gives Verizon greater scale in prepaid vs. AT&T and T-Mobile, which have historically dominated the market with ~20M prepaid subscribers each.
Indeed, the deal will expand Verizon’s prepaid customer base from 4M today to ~25M, including Tracfone’s 90K retail locations and 850 employees.(See VZ stock analysis on TipRanks)
Related News:
Is Roku the Future of TV Ad Monetization? Analyst Weighs In
Oracle, Walmart To Invest In TikTok Global After Trump’s Approval
Morgan Stanley Lifts Facebook’s PT On New Features
