Crown Castle has signed a new long-term agreement with Verizon to support Verizon’s 5G Ultra Wideband and 5G Nationwide deployment. Specifically, Verizon has committed to lease 15,000 new small cells from Crown Castle over the next four years. Once installed, the small cell leases will have an initial term of 10 years.
“Verizon has led the industry in 5G deployment and has been at the forefront of building a strong ecosystem of stakeholders who will continue to drive forward this essential platform for innovation,” said Gina Cacciatore, Executive Director of Network Engineering and Operations for Verizon. “This agreement with Crown is an important component of our 5G expansion plans and will advance the infrastructure requirements for many more people to access this revolutionary technology.”
“We are excited to expand our longstanding strategic relationship with Verizon with this significant small cell agreement,” stated Jay Brown, Crown Castle’s Chief Executive Officer. “We look forward to continuing to support Verizon’s growth as they deploy 5G Ultra Wideband and 5G Nationwide, and we believe our ability to offer a comprehensive solution with towers and small cells at scale provides us the best opportunity to deliver value as we support their wireless infrastructure needs.”
- 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.
- In December 2020, T-Mobile US, notified Crown Castle it was cancelling approximately 5,700 small cells contracted with Sprint Corporation ("Sprint Cancellation") prior to its merger with T-Mobile. The majority of the cancelled small cells were not yet constructed and, upon completion, would have been located at the same locations as other T-Mobile small cells. The Sprint Cancellation resulted in T-Mobile accelerating payment of all contractual rental obligations associated with the approximately 5,700 small cells as well as the payment of capital costs incurred to date.