Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica and Vodafone will set up 6,000 new cell sites for shared use.
Background: The German government recently set out initiatives to improve mobile coverage throughout the country. The spectrum licences awarded for 5G in June 2019, in the 2GHz and 3.6GHz bands, come with extensive coverage obligations for the operators that won them. The Federal Ministry for Transport and Digital Infrastructure also launched a Mobile Strategy and an “expansion campaign” to cover rural areas. The latter resulted in a commitment by MNOs to cover 99% of each federal state with 4G by the end of 2021.
The three main MNOs join forces: This week, the three main operators in the country (Deutsche Telekom, Telefonica, and Vodafone), announced they will cooperate to achieve the best possible mobile broadband coverage throughout Germany, especially in rural areas and along road, rail and inland waterway transport routes – a condition that the operators are required to fulfil as stipulated in the spectrum auction. To achieve this, the three MNOs will coordinate the setup and operation of up to 6,000 new cell sites. The new entrant 1&1 Drillisch, which acquired spectrum in the 5G auction, has also been invited to participate, providing it will take on an equal share of the expansion projects as the other parties. The plan proposes that each company participating in the collaboration should set up an equal number of new sites which can then be used by the collaboration partners and fitted with their own antennas and the appropriate network technology as required.
Next steps: The federal competition authority has been informed about the collaboration plans. In the past, the telecoms regulator BNetzA has made it clear that, in principle, it supports the joint use of infrastructure. Additional details of the collaboration should be formally agreed at the latest by spring 2020, after which the operators will begin the planning activities for the joint network expansion.
