Lumen ties flexible internet commissions to what customers actually use

Dive Brief

Lumen launched an Intelligent Internet service on Monday that lets customers provision connectivity and scale bandwidth up or down through its Lumen Connect portal or network APIs. It’s available at more than 10 million U.S. business locations, on-net or off, at up to 100 Gbps. Channel partners are already selling it, according to Ryan Asdourian, Lumen’s EVP and chief strategy and marketing officer.
Partners earn residual commissions on a customer’s full monthly usage rather than the committed minimum spend calculated in arrears on consumption, Asdourian said. A customer who cuts their bandwidth halfway through the month triggers no clawback. “Because compensation reflects real consumption, there is no scenario that would require a commission clawback due to a mid-month bandwidth adjustment,” he said.
That cuts both ways for partners with Lumen dedicated Internet access business. “Customers shifting from DIA to NaaS reduce their costs, which also reduces their commissions,” said Stephen Hancock, founder and CEO of Socium IT, a Lumen partner, in an email to Channel Dive. “For partners with a large Lumen DIA book, if they convert to NaaS, it will lead to a decrease in commission. For those without much DIA to start with, it’s a non-issue.” Socium IT, which sells bandwidth adjustment software, falls into the latter group.

Dive Insight

Lumen's selling point to enterprises is that they will spend less and gain more control. Intelligent Internet is priced so customers stop paying for peak capacity they don’t use. When partners are paid based on consumption rather than a committed floor, converted customers produce smaller residuals.

For partners, how much this helps or hurts depends on their legacy exposure to Lumen DIA, according to Hancock. Partners with little legacy exposure could be picking up a product with no incumbent to cannibalize.

Hancock told Channel Dive that Lumen emailed partners to confirm that Intelligent Internet is a rebrand of its Internet On-Demand product. Lumen's announcement describes the service as “the next evolution” of its enterprise Internet, “first delivered through Internet On-Demand.” The company put the availability at the same more than 10 million business locations the company claimed for Internet On-Demand in October 2025.

Asdourian pointed to new pieces, including term-based pricing and pre-ordering through a fabric port. Intelligent Internet’s flexibility creates work for partners that a fixed contract never did, Asdourian said. “If you think about it, just a static three-year term, that's a one-time conversation.”

Partners can charge to manage API controlled capacity changes. The fabric port becomes an attachment point for other services, whether Lumen's or a third party's. DDoS Essentials and Lumen Defender are bundled into Intelligent Internet.

Partners can participate across all three of what Lumen calls its pillars: physical infrastructure, programmable network and connected ecosystem. Asdourian described the latter as “the services that you need beyond connectivity.” He added: “It's all three of those together that really end up making a difference.”

Lumen’s mid-market enterprise revenue fell about 8% year over year in the second quarter, while strategic revenue grew 14% and became more than half of its total revenue.

A service customers can shrink without canceling is a solid churn defense, and the channel is its distribution. What to watch now is how many partners move their DIA base to Intelligent Internet and whether Lumen adds anything to its comp schedule to nudge them along.