SBA Communications Expands in Brazil after Acquiring 2,007 Additional Sites

Yesterday, SBA Communications announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement with certain subsidiaries of Oi SA, which is one of Brazil’s largest telecommunications service providers. SBA will acquire 2,007 tower sites in Brazil and once the transaction is complete, Oi will enter into a long-term lease agreement with SBA with monthly lease payments for antenna space on each of these sites. The transaction is expected to close on or before March 31, 2014 and SBA will pay approximately R$1.525 billion, which is around USD $645 million at the current exchange rate. “We are very pleased to acquire these high quality assets and expand our relationship with Oi,” commented Jeffrey A. Stoops, SBA’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “These are very good sites, concentrated in the most populous areas of Brazil, with demonstrated attractiveness to tenants. With this acquisition, we will have established SBA as one of the largest and most capable independent tower operators in Brazil, a market which we believe is very attractive and will produce strong growth in the future.”

Read more at InsideTowers.com.

Wi-Fi Tower To Be Completed Soon Bringing California Schools Internet Access

http://insidetowers.com/wi-fi-tower-completed-soon-bringing-california-schools-internet-access/

CTIA—The Wireless Association Announces 2014 Board of Directors

This week, CTIA—The Wireless Association hosted MobileCON 2013 in San Jose, California. MobileCON is a mobile IT and enterprise event designed for the IT executives and professionals. During this event, the CTIA announced their 2014 Board of Directors.

"CTIA's members provide U.S. consumers with the world's best wireless service and consistently make significant investments in the U.S. economy. Among the 2014 Board of Directors' goals is to make certain the U.S. wireless industry remains the world's leader in innovation so that Americans continue to benefit from wireless telecommunications. One of the key components to this is making sure more spectrum is made available for commercial wireless use. By working together and with the expert guidance of our board, CTIA will work diligently to ensure appropriate public policy that recognizes the need for the U.S. wireless industry to remain the best in the world," said Steve Largent, President and CEO, CTIA.

The one-year term as board members of the CTIA will begin on January 1, 2014. The Board of Directors will be comprised of:

• Robert Vrij, Executive Vice President and Chief of Global Sales, Alcatel-Lucent
• Charles Townsend, President and CEO, Aloha Partners II, L.P.
• Dr. Guy (Bud) Tribble, Senior Vice President for Software Engineering, Apple, Inc.
• Manny Becerra, Executive Vice President & President of Mobile Services, Assurant Solutions
• Bret Comolli, Chairman, Asurion
• Ralph de la Vega, President and CEO, AT&T Mobility, AT&T
• Thorsten Heins, President and CEO, BlackBerry Limited
• Ron Smith, President, Bluegrass Cellular, Inc.
• Marcelo Claure, Chairman and CEO, Brightstar Corporation
• Slayton Stewart, CEO, Carolina West Wireless
• Wirt Yerger, III, Manager, Cavalier Wireless, LLC
• Pat Riordan, President and CEO, Cellcom
• Steve Largent, President and CEO, CTIA-The Wireless Association
• Jay Shedd, President and CEO, DOCOMO PACIFIC, INC.
• Angel Ruiz, President and CEO, Ericsson Inc.
• Mary Chan, President, Global Connected Consumer, General Motors
• Mike Woodward, President, Emerging Devices, HTC America, Inc.
• S. Douglas Hutcheson, CEO and Director, Leap Wireless International, Inc.
• Jeff Gisoo Cho, Vice President, LG Electronics USA
• Rip Gerber, President and CEO, Locaid
• Eddie O'Brien, VP, Worldwide Sales and Marketing Operator Channel, Microsoft Corporation
• Jeff Miller, Corporate Vice President, Global Sales, Motorola Mobility
• Matt Rothschild, VP Sales and Marketing, Americas, Nokia, Inc.
• James Hyde, President and CEO, nTelos Wireless
• John Giere, President and CEO, Openwave Mobility
• George Appling, President and CEO, Personal Communications Devices, LLC (PCD)
• Richard Ruhl, General Manager, Pioneer Cellular
• Peggy Johnson, EVP and President of Global Market Development, QUALCOMM, Inc.
• Mike Narula, President and CEO, Reliance Communications LLC
• Gregory Lee, President and CEO, Samsung Telecommunications America, L.P.
• John Sims, President, SAP Mobile Services
• Justin E. Hinkle, Chief Operating Officer, Smith Bagley, Inc. DBA CellularOne of N.E. AZ
• Dan Hesse, CEO, Sprint Corporation
• Jeff Gordon, President and CEO, Syniverse
• John Legere, President and CEO, T-Mobile USA
• F.J. Pollak, President and CEO, TracFone Wireless, Inc.
• Kenneth Meyers, President and CEO, U.S. Cellular
• Dan Mead, President and CEO, Verizon Wireless

What Problems Could the Connected Car Cause Cell Phone Towers?

Last week at the PCIA’s 2013 Wireless Infrastructure Show, the Connected Car was a topic of discussion. As the wireless industry continues to expand, industry leaders are looking for new ways to bring wireless technology to every aspect of our lives including time spent in the car. It’s not news that people enjoy using their phones in the car. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention reported that, “31% of U.S. drivers ages 18-64 reported that they had read or sent text messages or email messages while driving at least once within the 30 days before they were surveyed.”

Many wireless carriers such as AT&T and Verizon, along with many insurance companies, have started campaigns to urge people to not text and drive. The Connected Car aims to lower the rate of texting and driving while bringing you access to more wireless technology while you are in your car. Iain Gillott of iGR discussed the features of the Connected Car in a webinar yesterday.

The Connected Car would have a built-in LTE connection to the macro network that can connect to a Wi-Fi hotspot that is within the vehicle. Passengers will be able to access a wireless signal over the LTE connection. Gillott noted that, “We spend a lot of time in our cars as a society.” He says in the webinar that approximately 20% of Americans spend more than 60 minutes per day in the car.

While having access to technology like this on the road seems like a fantastic idea, what will it do to our networks and macro sites? “In-car data use increases bandwidth demand at peak network times and it adds to the network congestion problem,” Gillott explains.

Because the vehicle is moving, small cells will not work for cars so our macro networks will become congested. This is a challenged that supporters of the Connected Car face. Although this new technology is an opportunity for our mobile network infrastructure to grow, it’s not always easily achieved. It’s possible that our networks will be slow and over-capacity because of the Connected Car before more cell sites can be built to accommodate the influx in demand. 

Ruckus Wireless Named Leader in IDC MarketScape

Today Ruckus Wireless announced that it had been named a leader in the “IDC MarketScape: Worldwide Enterprise WLAN 2013-2014 Vendor Analysis.” This study looked at a variety of vendors that are part of the wireless LAN (WLAN) market. Ruckus Wireless is a global supplier of advanced wireless systems for the rapidly expanding mobile infrastructure market.

“This IDC MarketScape assessed the enterprise wireless LAN market through the lens of indoor WLAN infrastructure, with an emphasis on the current 802.11n standard and various deployment architectures. Capabilities and strategies for the emerging 802.11ac standard also played a role in IDC's analysis, as did offerings in the service provider WLAN space for cellular offload and managed services. IDC projects the worldwide market for enterprise wireless LAN equipment will grow from $4.6B in 2013 to over $7.8Bby 2017, with the biggest gains coming within the service provider and education sectors,” Ruckus Wireless explained.

Ruckus Wireless offers a wide range of indoor and outdoor products to mobile carriers, broadband service providers, and corporate enterprises. Ruckus Wireless works to create technology that can increase network capacity in order to keep up with the growing demand of wireless and broadband services.

According to IDC, "Ruckus has a strong history of internal innovation, from the pioneering of IPTV to various advances in antenna technology, including being an industry pioneer in adaptive antenna array and many other advanced RF functionalities. Ruckus' BeamFlex™ beamforming technology and dual-polarized smart antenna arrays allow for efficient spatial multiplexing, and Ruckus claims improved coverage in tough environments with fewer APs.”

AMT Keeps “Outperform Rating”, CEO Sells 100,000 Shares of Company Stock

Yesterday, Deutsche Bank reiterated their “outperform” rating for American Tower Corporation (AMT). This means the analysts believe that the American Tower Stock is going to do better than the market return.

Before Deutsche Bank released their rating, CEO James Taiclet Jr. sold 100,000 shares of the company’s stock in a transaction dated Monday, October 7^th. The shares were sold at an average price of $72.73, for a total value of $7,273,000.00. Following the completion of the sale, Taiclet now directly owns 100,041 shares in the company, valued at approximately $7,275,982. You can view the form filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission here.

American Tower’s 52-week high is $85.26 and their 52-week low is $67.89. The AMT stock closed at $74.64 yesterday. Analysts at Nomura upgraded American Tower’s rating from “neutral” to “buy” back on September 16^th; whereas the analysts at Maquarie boosted the price target from $84 to $88 on September 17^th, giving American Tower an “outperform” rating.

American Tower released their 2013 Q2 earnings on July 31, 2013. They reported a core growth of 18.1% with a total rental and management revenue growth of 15.7%. The company expects the new business and core organic growth trends to remain favorable due to the carriers deploying networks worldwide. 

Wireless Isn’t Going Anywhere—Invest Now

Even though it seems that everyone is connected through mobile phones, there are approximately 1 billion people in the world that do not own a cell phone according to Kerry McQueeney of the Daily Mail. This means that wireless services aren’t going anywhere. They will continue to expand until they reach remote parts of the globe connecting people in a way they never thought possible. If you are looking at investment opportunities, you should consider the wireless tower industry.

Communication towers are being constructed all over the world, especially in the United States, in order to meet the demand for mobile communication. So much of our daily life takes place online, which many people now access via their cell phones. Without these communications towers, accessing this technology on the go wouldn’t be possible.

Tim Beyers of the Daily Finance strongly urges you to invest in American tower. “Analysts see American Tower growing its earnings base by about 25% annually over the next five years,” Beyers notes. It was estimated that there were 6.6 billion mobile phone subscribers worldwide at the end of 2012, and this number has been increasing approximately 9% each year. This trend suggests that the need for mobile broadband and communications is only going to increase. More and more devices, like tablets, are being connected to the 3G and 4G mobile networks in order to access the Internet anytime, anywhere.

“I'm not expecting a let-up anytime soon. Why? There's just too much business online. A June study published by eMarketer put total 2013 e-commerce sales at $1.2 trillion for the full year, with emerging markets such as Indonesia experiencing the fastest growth. The entire Asia-Pacific region is on track to produce $388 billion in online sales, up 23% year over year,” Beyers explained.

With so much information moving online along with the ability to communicate with people across the world, watch TV, listen to music, and purchase almost anything you could ever want the wireless industry isn’t going anywhere for the time being. The top tower companies in the United States will continue to build up their infrastructure in order to keep up with demand. 

Crown Castle Will Release Third Quarter Results Later This Month

 

Crown Castle International announced that they will release their third quarter 2013 results on Wednesday, October 23, 2013 after the market closes. Crown Castle has also scheduled a conference call for Thursday, October 24, 2013 at 10:30am.

Crown Castle owns, operates, and leases towers and other infrastructure for wireless communications. Crown Castle offers significant wireless communications coverage to 98 of the top 100 U.S. markets and to substantially all of the Australian population. Crown Castle owns, operates and manages over 30,000 and approximately 1,700 wireless communication sites in the U.S. and Australia, respectively. 

Anritsu Introduces Three Frequency Options for Wireless Field Engineers

Anritsu, a global provider of innovative communications test and measurement solutions, introduced three new frequency options for their PIM Master MW82119A Passive Intermodulation high-power, battery-operated, portable test analyzer. These new options will allow wireless field engineers and technicians to accurately conduct the top of the tower PIM measurements in the LTE 800 MHz and UMTS 2100 MHZ bands in addition to the LTE 2600 MHz band.

“The new options have been specifically developed to address the top bands planned for LTE network deployments, and can help ensure LTE networks do not suffer from lower data throughput caused by PIM interference. Coupled with the battery operation, small size, and ability to perform 40W PIM testing, the new options make the PIM Master MW82119A well suited for deploying, installing, and maintaining LTE networks using Remote Radio Heads (RRHs) at the top of the tower. The PIM Master MW82119A can also be used to measure PIM at traditional macro site installations, as well as in Distributed Antenna Systems (DAS),” Anritsu explained.

Anritsu provides solutions for existing and next-generation wired and wireless communication systems and operators. Anritsu products include wireless, optical, microwave/RF, and digital instruments as well as operations support systems for R&D, manufacturing, installation, and maintenance. 

AT&T Strives to Build The World’s Premier Network

Krish Prabhu, President and CEO of AT&T Labs, spoke this morning at the 2013 Wireless Infrastructure Show hosted by the PCIA. Prabhu is responsible for the technical and operational activities in the labs and oversees all research development. His main focus is on transferring the knowledge and technology gained through research into services that support AT&T operations and business.

Prabhu spoke about AT&T’s strategy to bring their network to as many people as possible. “Since 2008, we have invested almost 98 billion in the U.S., which is more than any other public company in American,” he said. This investment has brought us over 400 LITE markets, and AT&T expects their 4G LTE to cover nearly 270 million people by the end of 2013.

“The volume of wireless data traffic is now over 6x higher than the amount of voice traffic and there is continued pressure on the capacity which is driven by video, applications, smartphone and tablet growth,” Prabhu said.

AT&T 4G LTE innovative network architecture delivers low latency and fast speeds, remote radio heads and network element placements, as well as enhanced speed and reliability Ethernet backhaul.

AT&T plans to be substantially completed with the mobile network deployment by the summer of 2014 and by the end of 2015 AT&T will have 10,000+ new macro sites, 1,000+ DAS, and 40,000+ Small Cells. AT&T believes that small cells are a resourceful network solution that will help provide flexible coverage for their customers.

Sprint’s Strategy Aims To Connect People

Stephen Bye, Sprint’s CTO and Senior Vice President of Technology Development and Corporate Strategy, started off the PCIA’s 2013 Wireless Infrastructure Show by reminding us that connecting people is very powerful. Bye explains that, “it takes a network to bring that to life.” He believes that the network is the unsung hero of the wireless industry. “My smartphone isn’t smart unless it’s connected to a network,” Bye noted.

Sprint’s is working to making their network more sophisticated and intuitive. Bye commented on how incredible it is that so many people are choosing to communicate online with Twitter, Facebook, and other websites. With so many people choosing to interact online with one another, there are capacity challenges and data challenges that Sprint is facing. Consumer demand is increasing for video content and web content. Bye believes that it’s important to look at this important opportunity they have to discover how to provide the service they can.

Sprint’s main focus is customer experience. Many people assume that big data is purely for advertising reasons, but Bye remarked that there is a lot to be gained from the analytics provided by big data. You have the chance to look at the amount of data provided and decide what is the most important.

“There is no silver bullet. We’re going to keeping pushing innovation on all fronts,” Bye said. “We’re going to have to push the envelope on all levels to steady the capacity demands. We have an obligation to meet our customer needs. We also have an opportunity to for innovation, happiness, healthiness, and awareness.”

In closing, Bye explained that Sprint is working to make their devices more intuitive and less reactive so the device can anticipate your needs and provide them in the most efficient way. Bye said, “The network of tomorrow will be brilliant.”