At the end of 2020, Verizon Business announced that it will deploy its Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) offering, an all-encompassing network solution, to more than 9,000 Walgreens and Duane Reade retail locations across the U.S. in what Verizon Business’ CEO Tami Erwin called the “largest, fully customized, NaaS solution on this scale.”
According to Verizon Business’ Group VP of Sales Massimo Peselli, the Walgreens deal is what truly kickstarted the the development of the NaaS concept. Walgreens, he told RCR Wireless News, came to the carrier and asked for help delivering more automation and real-time experiences in the stores without creating a network bottleneck and without implementing technology and solutions that will become outdated and unusable.
