T-Mobile network chief on building lots of small cells: It’s ‘nightmarish’

T-Mobile’s top networking executive said the operator’s interest in adding small cells to its network has “certainly softened” following the close of its merger with Sprint. He said that T-Mobile plans to add capacity to its network by deploying Sprint’s 2.5GHz spectrum onto macro cell towers instead of adding more small cells.

Neville Ray, T-Mobile’s president of technology, explained that adding network capacity through the installation of additional small cells is time consuming and expensive due to the need to obtain construction permits and equipment for the devices…

He explained that much of the initial $40 billion in network spending T-Mobile has earmarked for the next three years would go toward building 15,000 new macro cell towers in order to raise T-Mobile’s total number of macro towers to 85,000 sites.
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