American Tower Corporation (ATC) has outlined growth opportunities around 5G mid-band deployment as the tower company reports strong Q1 figures.
The company reported revenue gains of two percent for the first quarter of this year, posting $2.56 billion for the period.
During the quarter, ATC confirmed that it added a total of 242 communication sites, of which 145 sites were acquired in the US and 97 in Europe.
In total, the company said it spent $148 million to buy the 242 sites. The company has more than 149,000 sites globally.
“The solid leasing trends we saw over the course of 2024 carried into the first quarter, with sustained demand across our global portfolio. In the US, accelerating broad-based mid-band deployments and the early indications of capacity-driven new site demand supported our highest quarter of services revenue since 2021," said Steven Vondran, American Tower’s chief executive officer.
The big three US carriers plus other smaller mobile operators in the country still have plenty of 5G spectrum to deploy to tower sites, largely due to the Federal Communications Commission's inability to reallocate additional spectrum to carriers following the spectrum lapse two years ago.
In its financial report, ATC also touched on its data center business, CoreSite, which finalized its acquisition of a multi-tenant data center facility in Denver, Colorado. The facility currently hosts CoreSite’s DE1 data center operations.
The company expects to generate total property revenue of between $9.9bn to $10.1bn for the full year, while it anticipates net income of $2.74bn to $2.84bn.
"Together with the resilient demand we’re seeing for our portfolio of assets, we remain focused on enhancing the quality of our earnings through active portfolio management, organizational and operational efficiency, disciplined capital allocation, and a strong balance sheet, positioning us to better navigate ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty while continuing to meet our customers’ critical connectivity needs," added Vondran.
In the company's earnings call, Vondran noted that the company is on the lookout to carve out more M&A deals, but cautioned that there have been limited opportunities in this area.
"So we’ll continue to be opportunistic where you find the right portfolio at the right price. We don’t see any large-scale opportunities that are taking us off our path," he said. "We’re still not seeing any huge opportunities out there that we think are compelling enough."
