Steel in the Air’s 2022 Predictions for Cell Tower Leasing and Valuation. While 2021 certainly impacted many industries negatively, the wireless industry wasn’t one of them. This past year was a particularly strong year for tower companies and landowners. Looking forward into 2022, we see more of the same. Wireless Service Provider Predictions. Wireless service […]
We reviewed the Elliott Management slickly produced attack on Crown Castle ($CCI). In short, Elliott believes that CCI has underperformed its peers, American Tower (AMT) and SBA Communications (SBAC). While the underperformance is clear, I also think that Elliott’s analysis omits to give proper credence to the opportunity that fiber/small cells may provide to Crown Castle that its peers will miss.
What is “future consent” you might ask? It is when a tower company asks for consent before they actually need it. In this case, Crown Castle is sending letters like the one below to landowners who have leases that require consent before something is allowed to happen. SItuations that might require consent include modifications to […]
One of the joys of being on this side of the business is the relationships we form with landowners- both leads and clients. This morning, I spoke with a lead who owns some land near Kansas City where Sprint PCS erected one of their first PCS towers. The subject tower has its own storied history- […]
Coupled with low cost of capital and their recent conversions to REITs, tower companies have every incentive to convert leases (long term operating expense) to easements (upfront capital expenditure).
A number of our clients have ground leases with Crown Castle that contain revenue sharing clauses. They contacted us recently to ask why their lease payments went down or up. Typically, the rent payment adjustments are being made because of what Crown Castle is referring to as adjustments in their master lease agreements with their wireless […]
Zoning Board Questions Whether They Should Be Forced to Allow Three Towers Within 300′ of Each Other First- start by reading this news article about how the Cape Elizabeth, ME planners are dealing with a request from Tower Specialists to build a new tower near an existing Crown Castle tower that has already been slated […]
Yesterday, in a surprise press release by Verizon, Verizon indicated that it had formed a joint venture with AT&T and Tillman Infrastructure to develop “hundreds” of communication towers with “the potential for significantly more new site locations in the future”. Tillman Infrastructure is relatively new to the US- but owns a few thousand towers in […]
As we look back over the first half of 2017, there has been much non-activity on the merger front. Many people (myself included) expected greater merger and acquisition activity but other than a few fiber related transactions, nothing material has transpired. Sprint and T-Mobile are still separate companies, and DISH has not merged with or […]
We are currently working on a bespoke research project for a client where we examine the overlap between Sprint and T-Mobile cell sites. The merger talks seem to have stalled while Softbank talks to Comcast, Charter, Warren Buffett, and anyone who will listen about merging or investing. Nonetheless, there is still investor interest in […]