Administration Tightens Huawei Ban

The Biden administration has stopped approving licenses for U.S. companies to export most items to Huawei, according to three people familiar with the matter, Reuters reports. Huawei has faced U.S. export restrictions around items for 5G and other technologies for several years, but officials in the U.S. Department of Commerce have granted licenses for some American firms to sell certain goods and technologies to the company. For example, Qualcomm Inc. (NASDAQ: QCOM.O) received permission in 2020 to sell 4G smartphone chips to Huawei.

A Commerce Department spokesperson said officials "continually assess our policies and regulations" but don’t comment on talks with specific companies. Huawei and Qualcomm declined to comment. Bloomberg and the Financial Times reported the move earlier. Continue Reading

AT&T Outlines FWA Plans

By Martha DeGrasse, Inside Towers Contributing Analyst

With Charter and Comcast together adding just shy of a million new mobile lines in Q4, the competition between wireless network operators and broadband providers continues to intensify. While cablecos muscle into mobile, telcos are building their fiber and fixed wireless access businesses and taking market share from traditional ISPs. Fixed wireless access has gotten a lot of attention from analysts since it enables mobile network operators to use existing tower leases and radio assets to offer broadband internet service. T-Mobile and Verizon have been updating Wall Street on their quarterly progress with FWA for residential customers, while AT&T has continually endorsed fiber to the home (FTTH) as its preferred home broadband bet. Continue Reading

Lumen Feels the Need for Speed

By John Celentano, Inside Towers Business Editor

Lumen Technologies (NYSE: LUMN), based in Monroe, LA, has stepped up its optical transport game with its nationwide 400 Gbps (400G) wavelength network rollout. This comes after a significant dark fiber network expansion in the U.S. At the end of 2022, Lumen reported it upgraded over 24,000 fiber route-miles across its U.S. intercity network. This expansion bolsters network performance and supports the deployment of its next-generation optical platform that is specifically designed to deliver customer wavelength services up to 400G now and higher speeds in the future. Lumen is building scalable networks in data centers and the public cloud, designed to follow where customer data and applications reside so Enterprises can gain faster connections to the big cloud service providers. The company says that its wavelength services will help modernize customers' core digital network with required resiliency, scalability, and ultra-low latency to help businesses grow. Wavelengths are private, dedicated fiber connections with optical encryption that protects data as it is transported. Enterprise customers can customize network services to support their digital needs using a Lumen-furnished app called Topology Viewer. Continue Reading

Nokia Global Sales on the Rise

By John Celentano, Inside Towers Business Editor

Nokia (NYSE: NOK), headquartered in Espoo, Finland, bolstered its position as a leading global communications equipment supplier with double digit top line growth in 2022. Consolidated sales grew 12 percent year-over-year to $27 billion, and operating profit grew 9 percent to $2.5 billion. During 2022, Nokia invested $4.9 billion or 18 percent of sales in research and development. For 2023, the company is projecting sales of $27-29 billion with operating margins in the 11.5-14 percent range. Pekka Lundmark, Nokia President and CEO comments, “As we look into 2023, even as some developed markets, like North America, mature, other markets, like India, are just starting to ramp up. So, we see the addressable markets for Mobile Networks continuing to grow. With the recent deals won, we believe we are in a strong position to outperform the market.” Continue Reading

AT&T Reports on 5G and Fiber Buildout Goals

By John Celentano, Inside Towers Business Editor

AT&T (NYSE: T) is executing on its two strategic initiatives – the buildout of its nationwide 5G network, and expansion of its fiber network both within and outside its operating footprint. Its year-end 2022 results reflect that progress. The company expanded its retail wireless customer base to 104 million postpaid and prepaid subscribers, up over 3 percent on a year over year basis. Including connected devices and reseller lines, AT&T’s wireless network supported over 217 million connections on December 31.  It is ahead of schedule with its C-band 5G spectrum rollout objective, now reaching 150 million mid-band 5G POPs, more than double its initial 2022 year-end target. Where mid-band 5G is deployed, 25 percent of the traffic already utilizes that spectrum. The company expects to cover more than 200 million people with mid-band 5G by the end of 2023. Continue Reading

Verizon Closes Out 2022 On a High Note

By John Celentano, Inside Towers Business Editor

Not to be outdone by its wireless and cable company rivals, Verizon (NYSE: VZ) reported strong 4Q22 results and offered a positive outlook for its 2023 operations. Despite some quarterly gyrations during 2022, one of the more closely watched performance metrics is subscriber net additions. In Verizon’s case, this metric applies to wireless retail comprising postpaid and prepaid subs, fixed wireless access, and wireline broadband under the company’s FiOS-branded fiber-to-the-home service. For the year, the company had 2.2 million postpaid and prepaid wireless net adds, 1.2 million in 4Q alone, bringing its industry-leading total to 143.3 million wireless retail subscribers. Wireless service revenues for 2022 grew nearly 9 percent year-over-year to over $74 billion, accounting for 54 percent of the company’s total revenues. Continue Reading

American Tower Considers Takeover Bid of Cellnex

By J. Sharpe Smith, Inside Towers Technology Editor

American Tower Corporation (NYSE: AMT) and Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. are considering a takeover bid for Barcelona-based tower company Cellnex Telecom, including taking it off the stock market, Spanish news outlet Okdiario reported last Friday. Cellnex’ stock rose based on the news, while American Tower’s fell.  The report of a possible deal came on the heels of a shake up in management at Cellnex. The tower company appointed Alfonso Álvarez as chief executive of its subsidiary in the United Kingdom, replacing David Crawford, according to Okdiario. Last week, Inside Towers reported that Tobias Martinez resigned as CEO and Director of Cellnex, effective June 1, 2023. Continue Reading