South Wireless Summit Coverage
The tower industry is a great place to be in 2021, according to the Tower Panel at this week’s South Wireless Summit, but tower companies are keeping their eye on diversification opportunities.
Vogue Towers’ CEO Pat Troxell-Tant, who moderated the Tower Panel, discussed the current health of the communications tower industry, diversification and future wireless infrastructure opportunities with panel members Christian Hillabrant, Chief Operating Officer, Tillman Infrastructure; Bob Paige, Senior Vice President, Mergers and Acquisitions, Vertical Bridge; and Ron Bizick, CEO and Co-founder, Tarpon Towers.
Vertical Bridge’s business is 99.5 percent macro towers, Paige said, because there are “tremendous opportunities.” While the tower company is involved in node-only small cells, in-building coverage and edge data centers, those areas account for less than one percent of its business.
“We are going to always spend the majority of our time in macro towers,” Paige said. “Why? Because, first and foremost, it’s a great business. It’s got a tremendous amount of tailwind to it. We see tremendous growth in 5G over the next five to 10 years for macro towers. We’ve got a fourth carrier building out, and we’ve got all this new spectrum that’s been issued.”
With that said, Vertical Bridge is seeing some interest from customers for edge-to-suit, in-building coverage in smaller facilities and small cells. “We are absolutely going to listen to our customers. We are going to look at those opportunities,” Paige said.
Tillman is primarily seeing demand for its existing macro tower assets, but operators are beginning to request, not only the construction of the tower asset, but turnkey services that include tenant line installation, equipment installation, integration and basic optimization.
“I think it is very exciting, and it’s an opportunity for additional business in our space,” said Hillabrant. “We’re dedicated to building infrastructure networks to actually deliver packages and services.”
Tarpon Towers is a pure play macro tower company, and Bizick said towers are the “best part” of the wireless infrastructure business, and he believes it will remain that way for years to come. He added that he doesn’t believe a company has to diversify to be relevant.
“We are not necessarily trying to be all things to all people, like a Swiss Army knife,” he said. “Some people might be built for that. Frankly, we just don’t focus there, and I don’t think every company has to do that.
“This is going to be an amendment business primarily for many years to come,” he added. “Carriers are going to touch the towers first that already exist.”
In terms of near-term opportunities for towers, DISH Network’s proposed nationwide 5G network represents the first greenfield opportunity for lease up and build out in 25 years. DISH has significant pressure to build out its network, because of the FCC’s buildout requirements, according to Paige.
“So, clearly, they’re very active,” he said. “They are building out a next generation network from day one, which is incredible when you think about how technology has advanced over the last 25 years.”
DISH, which is building out a single generation of wireless technology, will have some strategic advantages over the other three carriers, which still are supporting 3G, as well as 4G technology, according to Paige.
“DISH will start out from day-one building out 5G,” he said. “That’s going to put a lot of pressure on the whole ecosystem, obviously on the other carriers but also on us. We will have to learn what a de novo 5G network looks like.”
Paige said he believes the DISH network will have unintended consequences, which, while disruptive, will be positive for the wireless industry. He expects it will take between five and 10 years for DISH to become a competitive carrier.
Another big trend in wireless is the build out of broadband internet in rural areas. “WISPs [wireless internet service providers] have fueled the market for lease up in the last year,” said Hillabrant. “So we’re very bullish on the internet partnership with WISPs, we expect to see a lot there.”
Although it is early days, Hillabrant said Tillman is keeping its eye on the viability of private LTE for large oil, gas and utility companies.
“We feel that it may be more of a lease up opportunity, rather than necessarily a BTS opportunity but that remains to be seen, based on the credibility of those customers,” Hillabrant said.
Vertical Bridge has set up a dedicated group to focus on non-traditional carriers, such as the WISPs and the winners of the FCC’s $20.4 billion Rural Digital Opportunity Fund to bring high speed fixed broadband service to unserved rural areas. When it comes to private LTE networks, Vertical Bridge has not seen much interest from the big three public carriers, according to Paige. But at other companies, such as Boingo, it’s a different story.
“At Boingo, because they’re working with manufacturing companies, the Air Force and with the military bases, private LTE networks are a hot topic,” he said. “Where your customer is a smaller enterprise, private 5G LTE networks are absolutely being asked for and they’re looking at it to see if they make sense from an economic standpoint.”
By J. Sharpe Smith, Inside Towers Technology Editor
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