AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile and Verizon are investing more money than ever before into LTE strategies, with regional carriers AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile alone accounting for billions of dollars and 300 million Americans covered.
“In the last five years, the American government has made almost 300 MHz of new spectrum available to wireless operators,” American Tower Corporation CEO James Taiclet Jr. said in the company’s quarterly conference call last week. Looking ahead, Taiclet said his company will be “committed for the public safety build out … likely to require new antenna and control infrastructure being placed onto American Tower’s cell sites.”
Android Headlines reported that Taiclet predicts 5G standards won’t be finalized until 2019, with more development until then to be in the 4G LTE realm. He also predicted mobile data and high performance LTE use will grow between 30 and 40 percent annually, with additional investment from big carriers to aid in the growth. This also includes more macro cell sites, extra 4G equipment and added small cells.
Verizon plans to spend $17 billion on capital expenditure (capex), Android Headlines reported, with an estimated third quarter wireless capex at $24 per subscriber. While Sprint planned on spending $3 billion in 2016 on capex, the company will come in under that mark, at $8 on wireless network upgrades per customer.
T-Mobile’s U.S. Chief Financial Officer said in the company’s quarterly update there will not be “any slowdown to our overall capital intensity,” while BTIG’s data shows T-Mobile U.S.’ network expenditure at $22 per customer, according to the account. With AT&T in the thick of the Time Warner deal, industry insiders predict the company won’t spend as much in 2017 as it did in 2016, on network upgrades. Android Headlines, however, noted that AT&T may need to increase the network “in order to ensure that their mobile video platform—which will be using Time Warner—performs as customers expect.”
November 1, 2016
Reader Interactions