Cellnex, Vodafone and O2 Extend Existing UK Mast Sharing Partnership
Wireless infrastructure firm Cellnex has today extended their existing partnership with UK mobile providers Vodafone and O2 (Virgin Media), which will ensure that both operators continue to have access to share Cellnex’s national tower infrastructure to help deploy 5G (mobile broadband) and future services.
The expected move follows shortly after VMO2 and Vodafone reached a new 10-year network sharing agreement (here), which was necessary in order for Vodafone to satisfy several network and competition concerns related to their separately proposed plan to merge with rival mobile operator Three UK.
However, the official announcement doesn’t include any solid details on what has changed in the new Cellnex agreement, although Vodafone’s proposed merger will inevitably mean some changes.
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Andrea Dona, Chief Network Officer of Vodafone, said:
“This partnership helps us both expand and maintain our reliable network in all corners of the UK, not only now, but also in the future. We look forward to continuing to work with the team at Cellnex”.
Jeanie York, CTO of Virgin Media O2, said:
“This partnership will help us maintain and upgrade our existing sites across the country and ensure we continue to provide our customers with the fast and reliable mobile connectivity they increasingly rely on as we invest billions of pounds each year in our networks and services”.
At this point it may be worth reminding readers that Cellnex UK also acquired Three UK’s (CK Hutchison’s) mast sites a couple of years ago. The UK transaction between Cellnex and CK Hutchison was formally approved by the CMA on 3rd March 2022, subject to the divestment of around 1,000 of Cellnex’s existing UK sites which overlapped geographically with the CK Hutchison sites to be acquired.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook, BlueSky, Threads.net and Linkedin.
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Will this lead to a change in the way shared sites are operated moving forward? (i.e. Vodafone hosting west, O2 east and north of Scotland). It’s very frustrating living in an O2 host area as a Vodafone customer knowing O2 customers are getting 5G here but I can’t and likely won’t for the foreseeable.
Easy solution move to o2 I have noticed that Vodafone’s roll out of 5G in and about Edinburgh is very poor.
Very unlikely to – Cellnex provide the structures on which MNO’s install equipment.
The choice of radio equipment & deployment is the MNO’s choice, and nothing really to do with Cellnex as national site provider.
As a digital nomad who travels mostly through the Scottish highlands and islands I would love to see much more mast sharing in rural areas. I would consider regulations to force mast sharing in rural areas. My current motorhome internet bill is £85 month for Starlink Roam and £55 a month for two sims (EE and Three). On top of that I am paying for dual sims in my iPhone another £55, in total £195 month to stay reasonably connected when away from the van while on call.
The vast majority of people in the UK live in urban areas fully covered by all the providers. These providers compete mainly on price, services and customer care and forcing mast sharing is not going to impact there profits greatly.
why so many sims? none of them support VoWiFi? a multi sim WiFi router would likely cut your monthly cost considerably.
> £55 a month for two sims (EE and Three)
Sounds like you need Scancom! Three UK unlimited for £9 per month and EE unlimited for £11 per month.
This is what the Shared Rural Network is trying to resolve. The operator funded phase has just concluded and the bulk of the government funding is targeting Scotland. It’s just not something you can do overnight but it is in progress
I believe the mobile mast by Cellnex by Mount Way, Parkway in Telford is now on 5G for EE. Meanwhile there is new mobile mast at Hermitage Way, Telford today.
Photo 1: https://i.ibb.co/PmRcvYx/20240730-134727.jpg
Photo 2: https://i.ibb.co/cJLhfFS/20240730-135032.jpg
Photo 3: https://i.ibb.co/RYNhhpq/20240730-135102.jpg