While the wireless industry gears up to bid on TV broadcasters' unwanted 600 MHz spectrum licenses in the FCC's scheduled incentive auction, tower-climbing companies are preparing for the work involved in repacking those broadcasters' remaining operations.
"We're in the famine period now, getting ready for the feast. So here we are: we're skinny as hell and the food is going to kill us," explained Thomas Silliman, president of Electronics Research, of the relative dearth of tower-climbing work today compared with the expected demand during the repacking process. "The problem is that we can only do so many [jobs] together in a given time period."
As wireless carriers like Verizon and AT&T wind down their macro LTE tower buildouts, TV broadcasters may soon begin hiring those tower-climbing crews to work on their station repacking -- work that in some cases can involve building a 20,000-pound antenna and then hoisting it up a 2,000-foot tower. Feature