Rahul Gaitonde, Deputy Editor, BroadbandBreakfast.com
WASHINGTON March 10, 2011 – American Tower, the Boston-based wireless and broadcast infrastructure company, announced Thursday it had joined the Rural Cellular Association.
“American Tower is glad to join RCA, and we support their mission — advocacy for rural and regional wireless carriers,” said American Tower’s Steven Marshall, Executive Vice President and President, U.S. Tower Division through a statement.
American tower leases space on towers along with offering colocation solutions to support wireless networks in the United States, Brazil, Mexico India and the United Kingdom.
“American Tower is a fantastic addition to our membership, and I look forward to working together to help achieve the President’s initiative to deploy advanced wireless communication to 98 percent of Americans within the next five years,” said RCA CEO Steven K. Berry.
RCA represents nearly 100 member wireless providers serving rural and regional areas of the United States.
Wireless carriers and companies like American Tower benefit from leasing infrastructure from municipal providers. They are able to provide hundreds of megabits per second of bandwidth to towers for the delivery of mobile broadband services. These carriers and providers are considered anchor tenants for municipal broadband networks. Their sharing of the infrastructure pays for the cost and generates cash-flow to cover residential areas.