Analysts Unsure of How Much Operators Will Spend on Wireless Networks in 2014

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Analysts are less certain how much United States operators will spend this year as market leaders Verizon and AT&T have largely finished building their 4G networks, leaving them to add further capacity when customer demand requires it. While these two companies have the majority of their 4G LTE deployments completed, it doesn’t mean the other companies are finished just yet. Reuters reported, “Others want to catch up on 4G to compete. Third-largest operator Sprint plans to spend $8 billion this year and next on a major network upgrade. Backed by Japan’s Softbank, Sprint chose Alcatel, Nokia and Samsung as suppliers, dropping long-time vendor Ericsson. T-Mobile US, which is owned by Deutsche Telekom, also spent $3.3 billion in January to buy mobile spectrum from Verizon to beef up its coverage. Gartner predicts North American operators will spend 9 percent more on mobile gear this year, from 6 percent last year. But investment bank UBS expects capital expenditures on mobile networks to rise only 1 percent and Bernstein sees it as flat.”

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