FCC Approves Crown Castle Takeover of Lightower Fiber Assets
FCC staff cleared Crown Castle's proposed buy of Lightower's 30,000 route miles of fiber. No opposition comments were filed (see 1708230039), said a Wireline Bureau order in docket 17-204. "Although Applicants have overlapping services in the Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, New…
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York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Washington, DC metro areas, the two companies primarily provide different services to different customers, thereby lessening the likelihood of the transaction reducing competition," said the order: "Applicants assert that they provide fiber-based service to only 454 of the same on-net locations, of which only 235 are enterprise locations," or only about 1.2 percent of their combined on-net enterprise locations, and they "provided information showing that, even in the overlap areas, multiple competitors providing fiber-based services are also present." It said combinations of providers "with largely complementary service areas are less likely to result in harm to competition and may result in a stronger competitor to larger carriers and [ILECs]."