Dense SoCal fiber footprint is expected to boost small cell deployments.
Crown Castle has agreed to acquire Los Angeles-based fiber and data center provider Wilcon for $600 million.
According to transaction information provided by Crown Castle, privately held Wilcon has a fiber footprint of about 1,900 route miles that Crown Castle indicated would provide “an extensive set of dense metro fiber assets in Crown Castle’s fastest-growing and most active market for small cells” and that it plans to “leverage Wilcon’s complementary assets to execute on [a] substantial small cells pipeline.” The Wilcon purchase is expected to close in the third quarter.
Crown Castle CEO Jay Brown said in a statement that in addition to support for short-term small cell deployment, “longer-term, we believe Wilcon’s well-located assets across the greater Los Angeles and San Diego metro areas, combined with its currently low utilization rate provide us with a long runway of growth opportunities to pursue small cell deployments for our wireless customers as they seek to improve and enhance their networks to meet growing demand for high-speed, high-capacity wireless services.”
Wilcon has substantial fiber infrastructure in urban Los Angeles and San Diego, as well as across the Los Angeles region including cities such as Anaheim, Irvine and Santa Monica. It offers dark fiber, lit fiber transport and colocation. The company has 44 data centers and colocation facilities within its Southern California network, and another 17 data centers and interconnection hubs that it considers “near-net” to its network, according to the Wilcon website.
Crown Castle said it expects Wilcon operations to contribute about $40 million to gross margin and $10 million in expenses in the first year of ownership.
The purchase will bring Crown Castle’s fiber assets to more than 28,000 route miles, the company reported. Crown Castle’s $1.5 billion purchase of Florida and Texas fiber provider FiberNet closed in January.
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