Major telecom companies in the U.S., including CenturyLink (NASDAQ:$CTL), experienced a tough 2Q17. The company serves 10.7 million voice line customers and 5.9 million broadband customers.

As a general consensus, Wall Street speculates CenturyLink’s fiscal 2Q17 earnings to decrease. Report earnings per share, similarly, will fall to $1.95 compared to 2016’s $2.45. Overall, internal management expects operating revenues for the year to be between $4.06 billion and $4.12 billion.

So, what happened? For starters, the company’s enterprise and consumer components were negatively impacted by higher losses in legacy services and weaker performance in strategic services. Consumer revenue stream fell around 6.2% year over year; Enterprise revenue fell around 9% year over year.

To add onto the market pressure, CenturyLink’s competitors, including Verizon (NASDAQ:$VZ), AT&T (NASDAQ:$T), and COMCAST (NASDAQ:$CMCSA) are simultaneously looking at gaining market shares.

As a rebuttal, CenturyLink looks to partner with Level 3 Communications company to bolster resilience. Indeed, CenturyLink has acquired Level 3 Communications for $34 billion in cash and stock to scale its Enterprise segment and enhance top line performance.

Additionally, the company will optimize its Broadband segment, a key long-term growth driver. Specific tactics include acquiring higher-value bundle users, de-emphasizing standalone broadband customers, faster speeds, and new lifetime pricing offers.

While speaking on such strategy, CEO Glen Post III stated: “We are confident our continued investment in high-quality, high-bandwidth broadband network infrastructure positions CenturyLink well for long-term growth.”

Featured Image: twitter