EE, O2, Three UK and Vodafone Sign Deal to Fix Mobile Notspots

The Government has confirmed that EE (BT), O2, Three UK and Vodafone yesterday signed a “key agreement” as part of the £1bn Shared Rural Network (SRN) project, which sets out a contract for how the four operators will work together to build new sites that deliver 4G based mobile broadband coverage across “total not spots.”

The SRN is an industry-led scheme – supported by a public investment of £500m and £530m from operators – that aims to help extend geographic 4G coverage to 95% of the UK the end of 2025 (it may also help the 5G rollout). The scheme essentially involves both the reciprocal sharing of existing masts in certain areas and the demand-led building and sharing of new masts in others between the operators.

The formal SRN agreement was officially signed off last March 2020 and in February 2021 it was announced that O2, Vodafone and Three UK had reached an agreement to both build and share 222 new 4G mobile masts as part of the first SRN phase (here).

Shortly after that EE unveiled their own phase one work to tackle “partial not-spots” (here), which will see their 4G coverage being expanded across 579 rural areas during 2021 (333 in England, 132 in Scotland, 76 in Wales, and 38 in Northern Ireland). This includes the 110 areas that EE has already upgraded since the SRN deal was signed.

However, yesterday’s agreement between all four operators should enable the SRN programme to progress. In response, the Government has today published their transparency notice for the SRN programme, which means they can also proceed with their £500m investment to “provide all corners of the UK with better mobile connectivity.”

Matt Warman, UK Minister for Digital Infrastructure, said:

“The Shared Rural Network is a key part of the government’s infrastructure revolution to level up and unlock new economic opportunities in every corner of the UK.

Mobile firms are making great progress boosting 4G services in countryside communities as part of their side of this landmark agreement.

With the publication of this notice, we shall now push on with making patchy or poor coverage a thing of the past as we build back better from the pandemic.”

In the past almost every new programme of rural mast building that we’ve ever seen has tended to run into some problems with cost, supply (power, fibre etc.), access (wayleaves) and / or local opposition to related planning applications for new infrastructure.

Many rural communities tend to cry out for mobile improvements, but at the same time not everybody wants to “see” the masts that need to be built. Unfortunately, you can’t have one without the other. But some of these problems may well be tackled through the Government’s Mobile Planning Reforms.

The SRN is being overseen by a jointly owned company called Digital Mobile Spectrum Limited (DMSL).