Previously I noted that Verizon was selling off 1.6 million rural New England customers. VZ is selling them to a company called Fairpoint:

The operations in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, serving 1.5 million homes, will be acquired by FairPoint Communications Inc. of North Carolina, the companies announced Tuesday. FairPoint owns local phone networks in 31 mostly rural markets in 18 states, including the three where it is acquiring Verizon’s business.

Verizon to sell New England assets, BRUCE MEYERSON, Associated Press, Posted on Tue, Jan. 16, 2007

The Communication Workers of America (CWA) had tried to stop the sale in the interests of saving jobs. The parties to the sale say that’s not a problem:

Hoping to head off worries among local officials that Verizon’s planned exit might lead to deterioration in phone and Internet service, the companies emphasized there would be no layoffs and that FairPoint would invest heavily in the region to expand broadband availability to more homes.

I don’t know what that does to CWA’s membership, or what sort of jobs these new ones are.

Meanwhile, about that rural broadband availability:

It was unclear, though, whether FairPoint might revive any of the network upgrades that Verizon had begun in the region as part of “FiOS,” a multibillion project in which copper phone wires are being replaced with fiber-optic lines that can deliver cable TV and super-fast Internet access. FiOS Internet service is currently available to roughly 80,000 homes in southern New Hampshire.

Does that mean that FiOS doesn’t work too well to provide rural broadband?

FairPoint said it plans to invest $200 million on infrastructure improvements and systems development in the region, with half of that that amount being spent “even before we close the transaction,” said Gene Johnson, chairman and chief executive. FairPoint also said it plans to significantly increase broadband Internet availability in the region within the first 12 months after the deal is completed. The operations being acquired currently provide DSL Internet service to 180,000 customers.

So is Fairpoint going to provide this increased broadband availability through DSL?

Meanwhile, the AP story notes that Verizon, adding cherry-picking to redlining, is keeping the business-services operation in those states that came with MCI. And this isn’t the first case of this sort of redlining; Verizon already sold off customers in Hawaii, to the Carlyle Group.

Interestingly, the stock market is betting on Fairpoint, not Verizon:

FairPoint’s shares jumped $2.87, or 15.48 percent, to close at $21.41 on the New York Stock Exchange. Verizon’s stock slipped 17 cents to finish at $37.16 on the NYSE.

Is Verizon creating its own competition?

-jsq