SBA Communications (SBAC) said it plans to pay nearly $1.1 billion to acquire certain affiliates of Mobilitie, including more than 2,300 tower sites in the United States and Central America and certain indoor and outdoor distributed antenna systems in Chicago, Las Vegas, New York City and Auburn, Ala. SBA said the payment would include $850 [...]

Reacting to the growth of the small cell market, the Femto Forum announced it was changing its name to the Small Cell Forum in a move to align its focus with “residential, enterprise, metro and rural small cells, as well as to prevent the perception that the small cell arena is fragmented.” Despite its aim, [...]

Businesses are finding a growing demand to provide a wide variety of wireless technologies in the indoor space today. Wireless cellular customers depend on the mobility of their devices wherever they go. There is a need to implement a distributed antenna system (DAS) with the breadth of design requirements that allow it to carry a [...]

Global Tower Partners said it has signed an agreement with Brookfield Real Estate Opportunity Fund to manage and lease 41 properties to wireless carriers as prospective co-location sites. As part of the agreement, GTP has secured 4.5 million square feet of distributed antenna system rights for all buildings. Financial terms were not released. “We are [...]

The need to bolster LTE networks could result in more than 14 million radio transceivers being deployed in 2016, with half of those specific to the mobile broadband technology, according to a new report from Mobile Experts. The firm said that the increase in LTE transceivers is partly due to the complexity of the systems, [...]

Clearwire (CLWR) avoided a potential default on an interest payment and secured its near-term future through a new agreement with parent company Sprint Nextel (S). The deal also guarantees the availability of WiMAX services through at least 2015 and ties Sprint Nextel into Clearwire’s TDD-LTE plans. Clearwire’s stock surged more than 25% early Wednesday on [...]

Northern Kentucky University students are complaining that their cell coverage on campus is effectively unusable. According to the school’s student paper, the 15,000-student university is considering installation of a distributed antenna system, or DAS. The way the student paper discusses the problem, it’s not hard to imagine poor cell coverage becoming a key indicator of [...]

Mobile networks up to 3G were designed to deliver excellent coverage to the handset, accommodating small PCM voice channels on the order of eight kilobits to 16 kb, rather than high data speeds. 3G networks are deployed with radii typically around three to eight kilometers in diameter for the macrocell, and backhaul capacity of less than 50 megabits per second for connection to the core network. While most mobile networks today utilize 3G, operators are moving to technologies such as WiMAX 802.16e or even HSPA+ to claim “4G.” In 2011, the Global Mobile Suppliers Association counted 17 commercial LTE deployments, with 180 operators in 70 countries committing to LTE, with another 64 in service by 2012.

In the mobile handset world, there has long been a drive towards smaller more powerful devices. And even though the rise of the smartphone has seen a return to larger screen sizes, today’s handsets are still remarkably compact.

DALLAS – RCR Wireless News managed to secure exclusive video interviews with a number of key executives and speakers at PCIA’s 2011 Wireless Infrastructure Show this week in Dallas. The insight provided touched on a number of topics impacting the mobile infrastructure space, including current carrier consolidation plans, public safety network plans and the current operating environment for tower companies.