Welcome to this week’s edition of cell tower industry news, brought to you by Towercrews.net.
Last week two of the biggest events in the world of telecom happened simultaneously: Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, and NATE UNITE in San Diego, California. As such, there’s plenty to talk about in the world of cell towers and DAS. And as always, there’s plenty of regional/local stories revolving around cell towers. One of them is even a murder mystery…
It’s no surprise that one of the biggest focuses of NATE UNITE 2014 was safety. Dr. David Michaels, assistant secretary of labor for OSHA, addressed the conference by remote connection. At the conference NATE also announced and co-sponsored a new safety campaign to promote 100% tie-off when climbers are working on towers. Todd Schlekeway, executive director of the National Association of Tower Electors, called the campaign “an extremely high priority” for the organization. For more information on what happened at NATE UNITE 2014, click here. Also, watch this video interview that details the 100% tie-off campaign:
In news a little on the macabre side, police in Winston-Salem, North Carolina were able to use cell tower data to gain evidence against a murder suspect. It turns out that the data transmitted from his phone around the time of the incident places him within a mile of where the skull of the murder victim was found. It’s not definitive evidence, but it certainly doesn’t help his case either. While police access to cell tower records is extremely controversial, if it helps solve violent crimes it seems like we may see more of this.
American Tower Corp, reported that its fourth quarter of 2013 revenue increased. However, not all is in the black as increased expenses offset this increase, pushing earnings down a fair amount from where they were at this time last year. Meanwhile infrastructure services giant MasTec, announce record-breaking revenue for the fourth year in a row.
DAS news seemed to be everywhere at Mobile World Congress, despite the focus on small cells and virtualization. RCR Wireless News’ own Martha DeGrasse wrote a great breakdown of all the big DAS announcements, but here are the highlights: CommScope announced their new ION-E, an in-building DAS solution, TE Connectivity announced a partnership with Alcatel-Lucent (we told you about that last week), and Axell introduced intelligent digital DAS,which is definitely worth checking out. The other big news was AT&T working with Disney to deploy DAS at Disney resorts in both Florida and California.
Regional/Local Cell Tower News
- Georgia cell tower bill seems like a go, sent to governor to sign.
- Opposition against a cell tower brews in Saratoga, NY.
- Appeals board denies request for reconsideration of Boothbay, ME cell tower.
- Ridgewood, NJ zoning board continues discussion on temporary cell tower.
- Verizon seeks to replace cell phone tower in Mine Falls in Nashua, NH.
- Trespassers, cell tower addressed in Tewksbury, NJ.
- Lacey, WA council to review cell tower request.
