Crown Castle secured commitments for over 50,000 new small cell nodes during the last twelve months, which equates to approximately 70% of the total small cells the booked in its history prior to 2021, the company’s CEO Jay Brown said in a release.
“As a result, we now have approximately 55,000 small cell nodes on-air and more than 60,000 committed or under construction in our backlog. Our customers are already planning for the next phase of the 5G buildout that will require small cells at scale, and this inflection in our small cells business reflects how well-positioned we are to support their wireless network needs for years to come, with our more than 80,000 route miles of fiber concentrated in the top U.S. markets,” the executive said.
“I believe 2022 will be an important transition year for our small cells and fiber business, as we prepare to accelerate our deployment of small cells from approximately 5,000 this year to what we expect will be more than 10,000 per year starting in 2023,” Brown added.
Brown also noted that the company expects elevated levels of tower leasing to continue this year, saying, “We believe the U.S. represents the highest growth and lowest risk market in the world for communications infrastructure ownership, and we believe our comprehensive offering positions us to benefit from what we expect will be a decade-long investment cycle as our customers develop next-generation wireless networks. As a result, we expect the deployment of 5G in the U.S. to extend our opportunity to create long-term value for our shareholders while delivering dividend per share growth of 7% to 8% per year.”
Site rental revenues for full 2021 reaches $5.71 billion, up 8% compared to the previous year. For 2022, Crown Castle is forecasting site rental revenues to reach over $6.2 billion.
Income from continuing operations for full year 2021 was $1.2 billion compared to $1.1 billion for full year 2020.
Earlier this month, T-Mobile US and Crown Castle International had signed a new 12-year agreement to support the continued build-out of T-Mobile’s nationwide 5G network with increased access to Crown Castle’s towers and small cell locations.
Under the terms of the agreement, which includes 35,000 small cells, T-Mobile US will further expand the reach of 5G network to serve consumers across the U.S. while also realizing financial synergies following its merger.
Crown Castle owns, operates and leases more than 40,000 cell towers and approximately 80,000 route miles of fiber supporting small cells and fiber solutions across every major U.S. market.
