UK operator 3 finished phase 1 of their network upgrade [12,400 cell towers up and running]

British operator 3 has just completed phase 1 of their wireless network upgrade and the statistics they provide with that small bit of news are both funny and eye opening. The whole thing cost 400 million British pounds or roughly $630 million. Before the upgrade they had 7,500 cell towers, but now they have 12,400 covering close to 97% of the fish and chip eating nation that brought you Monty Python. Thanks to advances in infrastructure technology, plus agreements to share existing towers, they’ve actually managed to bring down 5,069 masts thus clearing up the landscape and improving power consumption.

Kevin Russell, CEO of Three UK said: “Thousands of people across the country have put in a phenomenal amount of work to build the UK’s biggest Mobile Broadband network. Smartphone and Mobile Broadband use is exploding and we have built a 3G network that reaches further than ever before, as well as bringing more capacity into urban areas where our customers need it most.”

Their network now carries over 100 terrabytes of information across it every day. That’s 20x the amount of information on Wikipedia. Close to 40% of that traffic are from 3′s customers using BBC iPlayer or watching YouTube videos on a regular basis, another 38% is web browsing, and close to 10% is people on MSN or Skype exchanging messages. Over 8.5 million man hours were spent upgrading this network, thanks to over 3,300 capable engineers doing their thing, of which 8 were attacked by birds while they were up fiddling with antennas.

These days you’ve got to make sure that you’re not the cheapest operator, but the one with the best data handling capabilities according to Nokia Siemens Networks. It’s why 3 did this upgrade and why across the pond Verizon is the largest operator in terms of customers, since they’ve always been pushing their network as the largest asset they can give customers. Not an inflated marketing budget à la AT&T.