American Tower Corporation (ATC) CEO Steven Vondran is optimistic that further spectrum deployment will generate more growth opportunities for the company.. Vondran made the comments during the company’s Q2 earnings call last week, where he cut a bullish figure on the upcoming spectrum cycle.. – Google Maps.
The tower company reported revenue growth of 4.7 percent for the quarter, posting total revenue of $2.7 billion. This was driven by strong leasing demand across the company’s tower portfolio, plus record leasing activity at CoreSite. For the quarter, data center property revenue growth was approximately 12 percent..
But it was the topic of spectrum that generated much of the discussion on the tower company’s earnings call.. It comes hot on the heels of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) setting out a plan to auction 160MHz of spectrum in the upper C-band by July 2027. This spectrum is important, as the FCC notes this will pave the way for a harmonized 5G ‘super band.’. “In terms of the Upper C-band, that will go on towers, and we do expect that over time, that we will get significant activity as a result of that,” said Vondran..
In total, around 800MHz of spectrum is expected to become available in the coming years, as carriers continue to upgrade their 5G networks, while looking ahead to 6G.. This will include lower-band spectrum, which Vondran also highlighted as a key opportunity for the company.. “With respect to the lower-band spectrum, what we’ve seen is that the carriers have been using that as a very good complement to the higher-band spectrum in their network, and it’s the layer cake of spectrum that I think people have talked about as part of 5G in terms of how they’re meeting that need.
We absolutely expect those lower bands to be deployed, and that will generate some revenue for us, just like every spectrum deployment does,” he added.. Indeed, the more spectrum utilized by equipment at the towerco’s 40,000-plus sites across the US, the more ready the carriers will be to deal with the growing demand for data usage.. “The real driver for us is mobile data growth.
The carriers will continue to deploy spectrum. As the mobile data growth goes up, they’re going to need to add more equipment with that to meet that demand,” adds Vondran.. Thinking about 6G, Edge compute.
While 5G is very much here and now, 6G is lurking in the thoughts of the mobile carriers and tower companies too.. This is no different at American Tower, noted Vondran, who talked of the importance of preparing for the technology which is expected to drive AI applications.. “The eventual transition to 6G will bring another meaningful infrastructure investment cycle.
Early indications point toward architectures that leverage higher frequency spectrum, greater intelligence at the network Edge, and more distributed deployments,” he said. “These characteristics would likely require both additional equipment and increased site density across wireless networks.”. He highlighted that the 6, 7, and 8GHz frequency blocks will go on the towers to support the deployment of 6G.. “Towers will be the backbone of 6G, just like it was the backbone of 5G, 4G, and 3G.
We think that will drive significant activity on towers over time as those bands become available. We also think that’s going to require more densification.”. Vondran added that one of the most exciting catalysts will be around the emergence of AI applications, and notes that AI-RAN is being looked at as a potential driver for Edge compute opportunities..
As well as owning data center firm CoreSite, American Tower is developing a number of Edge data centers at cell tower sites across the US. The company has identified “more than 1,000 plots of land” that it owns or has long-term leases for potential development into multi-megawatt data centers..
American Tower recently launched a 1MW facility in Raleigh, North Carolina, and has previously filed to develop another in San Antonio, Texas.. Vondran explained that the site in Raleigh has driven a lot of interest for the company, with companies showing an interest in putting their equipment in there.. “I’d say the biggest learning we’ve got from Raleigh so far is there is demand out there for capacity.
We’ve seen a lot of interest in that facility, that was probably a little bit more of a surprise to me, given that we were kind of building that as a test bed for innovation,” he said.. More in Investment / M&A / Financing. 27 Feb 2026.
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