Lumen Technologies revenue declined 12% year-on-year (YoY) to see it bank $2.72 billion in the third quarter of the year.

The firm's strategic revenues, which comprise network-as-a-service (NaaS) and cloud networking services such as the recently acquired Alkira, increased 10% during Q3 to $1.28 billion. Lumen's total number of NaaS customers rose to exceed 4,000 during the quarter, with active clients up 24% quarter-over-quarter (QoQ). Active ports rose 38% QoQ, while active services jumped 35% QoQ.

Going forward, the company revealed it will no longer share NaaS adoption metrics to instead concentrate on financial performance, with the business unit to be reported as part of its digital revenue and growth metrics.

Lumen's Alkira wins

Lumen revealed that since closing the Alkira deal it signed up VUMI Group as a customer, with the private medical insurer reportedly seeing its global network simplified through Alkira's cloud-native control plane.

Lumen's earning call saw CFO Chris Stansbury trumpet Alkira as the high-growth engine offsetting the accelerated decline of its legacy copper business.

"Many incorrectly believe that legacy revenue carries higher margin than strategic," Stansbury said. "Year-to-date, the average direct margin across our strategic portfolio is over 80% compared to approximately 65% for legacy. Strategic portfolio margins are meaningfully higher than legacy."

In this spirit, the firm revealed it will accelerate copper decommissioning in Iowa, Florida, Nevada, and Utah, moves it expects will generate up to $1.5 billion in pre-tax net copper recovery proceeds over five years.

"Copper is worth more to us mined than operated," CEO Kate Johnson said while outlining the firm's cloud-strong pivot. "We're no longer dependent on selling the next physical link in order to grow. We make money by moving data from anywhere to anywhere."