More AT&T Contractor Layoffs Affect the Industry

Another AT&T contractor has been forced to lay off workers, as the carrier takes a break from some of its wireless infrastructure projects, RCR Wireless reported. Velocitel, which does tower site work for AT&T in Oregon, reportedly had to release 25 of its roughly 85 Portland employees. Four of the 25 were LTE construction managers. Although AT&T officials claimed their bid for DirecTV would have no impact on their network deployment, this clearly isn’t the case.According to Martha DeGrasse of RCR Wireless, “A worker who was let go says that most of the Portland logistics team dedicated to AT&T was eliminated. Several coordinators and members of the closeout teams also lost their jobs. They say Velocitel is telling them that the AT&T work should come back soon, but things could get worse before they get better. Remaining Velocitel employees are hearing that more layoffs may be ahead. Velocitel has not yet responded to requests for comment.”

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AT&T’s Bid for DirecTV Negatively Impacts the Tower Industry

When consumers first heard rumblings that AT&T was looking to acquire DirecTV, questions arose about how this would affect their day to day lives in the tower industry. However, at the 2014 Wireless Infrastructure Show AT&T’s Network Operations President, Bill Smith, said, “I don’t think anybody should be concerned that this is a left turn by AT&T with respect to our investment in our network.” Well, concern is growing and rightly so. RCR Wireless reported that, “a leading AT&T contractor released 15 construction managers and project coordinators last Friday, and transferred five more to a Sprint project. Earlier this month, dozens of people were laid off by a major integration company, according to Wireless Estimator. At least one contractor has warned investors about the AT&T spending freeze and its potential impact, according to Michael Genovese.” The Wall Street analysts also reported that there was bad news from AT&T suppliers. Michael Genovese of MKM Partners told his clients that a “new widespread capital spending freeze in place at AT&T,” could impact vendors, and Jefferies & Company’s George Notter said his contacts were reporting sharp declines in revenue from AT&T. (Source: RCR Wireless)

Sprint is Taking Significant Strides

On June 23^rd, Sprint (S) held their Happy Connecting event in Chicago and although there was no jaw-dropping news, the company hosted a tower of a Sprint Spark cell site with Dr. John Saw, Chief Network Officer. “While we believe the announcements were received more as “ho-hum,” our cell site tour offered us more evidence that Sprint is indeed taking strides in the right direction with its network re-build,” Jennifer Fritzsche, Senior Analyst at Wells Fargo said. The tour was of a tri-band test site, where Sprint leverages its 8T8R technology on 2.5GHz, 1.9GHz (4T2R) and 800MHz (1T2R) radios. “Saw mentioned the technology also allows for multi-antenna processing (multi-mode MIMO). He mentioned 8×8 MIMO can achieve 4x speeds, and produce theoretical download speeds +1Gbps. With 3 carriers lit (60MHz total), theoretical speeds increase to +150Mbps. A software upgrade is required to light up each additional carrier. These cell sites improve urban coverage 20-25% (and help in-building coverage), suburban coverage by 50% and rural areas by 70%. S has deployed “hundreds” of these sites around the country thus far,” Fritzsche explained.

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FCC Cracks Down on Tower Companies

The FCC isn’t playing around and has issued two Notices of Apparent Liability for Forfeiture and Order regarding tower owners failing to keep their structures properly lit. On June 10th, the FCC proposed a fine of $15,000 against Northeast Passage Corporation, the owner of an antenna structure in Highstown, New Jersey, for violating the rules concerning antenna lighting. According to the NAL, “Agents from the Enforcement Bureau’s Philadelphia Office found that NE Passage was neither properly monitoring nor maintaining the daytime lights on its antenna structure. NE Passage also failed to notify the Commission of an increase in the antenna structure’s height. NE Passage’s disregard for the rules posed a potential safety hazard to air traffic and warrants an increased penalty.” More recently, on June 19th, the FCC proposed a penalty of $10,000 against Duhamel Broadcasting Enterprises for the same reason. According to the NAL, “Although Duhamel believed that the structure did not require lighting because of its position in a three-tower array, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) notified Duhamel officially that lighting was required for the antenna structure. Given that public safety is at risk when antenna structures are not properly illuminated, Duhamel’s failure to light the structure after the FAA notification warrants a significant penalty.” Make sure to keep your towers lit! If you supply tower lighting products and wish to be a part of Inside Tower’s July Product Showcase featuring Tower Lighting, then please contact Phil.

T-Mobile is Giving Out iPhones to Test its Network

Is there a better way to test your mobile network than to give out free iPhones for seven days with no strings attached? I don’t think so. At T-Mobile’s Uncarrier 5.0 event Wednesday night, CEO John Legere shared a new concept in the mobile industry: the test phone. Starting Monday, T-Mobile will send any potential customer an iPhone 5s and let him or her have free reign over its network for seven days. T-Mobile has been making a lot of network upgrades and on Wednesday, T-Mobile CTO Neville Ray revealed the carrier has piled a lot more spectrum onto its LTE network, increasing capacity and data speeds by 50 percent in 16 cities. It will be interesting to see how consumers respond to this test and how T-Mobile’s network handles the traffic.

Safety Equipment Fails Texas Tower Climber

Tuesday, June 17th a 28-year old man fell from a cell phone tower in San Angelo, Texas. During the investigation, detectives determined that the man fell as a result of an issue with his safety equipment. “What they found was that when he was working on the tower making some adjustments to his safety equipment there was some type of issue…and at that point he fell,” SAPD Public Information Officer Tracy Gonzalez said. The man worked for MTSI, a full wireless network deployment and maintenance company, which is based in Richardson, TX. The man was working on a tower of 140-feet, and is a fixture in the downtown area and was originally built to mount multiple large two-ton feed horns that were part of the old AT&T long distance TDM network called “1 plus.” Since AT&T deactivated the old “1 plus” network years ago, these towers have been sold off to various property owners and investors. Charlie Guyer, VP Communications for Goodman Networks, AT&T’s contractor for tower construction and maintenance issued a statement. “The company has just been informed of a fatality involving one of our subcontractors Microwave Transmission Systems (MTSI). We extend our deepest condolences to the family. We are conducting an investigation and are fully cooperating with local, state and federal authorities,” he said. Guyer said that his company routinely subcontracts with other companies to handle tower work all over the country.

Sprint Expands LTE Roaming Agreements with 12 Carriers

Sprint has been pretty busy lately. Between the talks about buying T-Mobile and now partnering with 12 regional carriers, they’re definitely trying to claw their way out last place among the big 4 carriers. The newly expanded roaming network covers 34 million people across 23 states and some 352,000 square miles. Divided among the dozen carriers, Sprint’s main focus is to create more wireless choice and competition across rural American markets. The mostly rural carriers include: SouthernLINC Wireless, C Spire Wireless, nTelos, Nex-Tech Wireless, Flat Wireless, SI Wireless, Inland Cellular, Illinois Valley Cellular, Carolina West Wireless, James Valley Telecommunications, VTel Wireless, and Phoenix Wireless. According to Sprint, customers will be able to roam on the 4G LTE networks of the new partners and vice versa. Sprint is also working with the 12 carriers in the hopes they will participate in their “device and infrastructure ecosystem,” aimed at helping to lower local network costs while also providing access to a more diverse device portfolio. “These agreements demonstrate Sprint’s commitment to provide better coverage, a faster network and a wider selection of lower-cost wireless devices to all customers, regardless of where they live,” said Michael C. Schwartz, Sprint Senior Vice President of Corporate and Business Development.