Lumen Technologies (LUMN) UBS Women in Tech Summit summary

Leadership and transformation

• New CEO brought in to drive a full turnaround, focusing on mission, vision, and culture change.

• Senior leadership team completely revamped with top talent from tech and telco sectors.

• Emphasis on diversity and creating more opportunities for women in leadership.

• Change management involved shifting from a legacy mindset to a growth and innovation culture.

• Board and leadership aligned on patience and commitment for a multi-year transformation.

Digital transformation and operational overhaul

• Shifted from a dividend-focused strategy to investing in future growth and efficiency.

• Streamlined processes, such as reducing service delivery times and improving customer satisfaction.

• Major initiative underway to unify four separate network architectures into a single, efficient platform.

• Consolidation of order, inventory, and billing systems to enable network-as-a-service (NaaS) offerings.

• Targeting significant progress on unified architecture and new revenue streams by year-end.

Market positioning and competitive differentiation

• Positioned as an enabler for AI, supporting hyperscalers and cloud companies with advanced fiber networks.

• Differentiation through modern, proprietary fiber infrastructure and digital customer experience.

• Only provider offering true NaaS and ExaSwitch, with capacity on demand and digital integration.

• Competes with both legacy telcos and digital upstarts, aiming to reclaim innovation in voice, connectivity, and security.

• Focused on large enterprise, public sector, and mid-markets for new digital services.