January 2017 | Business View Magazine

198 199 Shenandoah Tower Service, Ltd. year. And then, of course, there’s the company’s commitment to safety. “We have an outstand- ing safety record and we’re recognized for that throughout the industry,” he adds. As the wireless sector continues to grow and transform itself, Anthony says that STS is going to have to make some decisions soon about its ongoing business model. “What we do is sometimes the result of what our best custom- ers are asking us to do. That helps to clarify, a lot of times, what our decisions need to be,” he says. “There are small cell and DAS (Distrib- uted Antenna System) deployments now that are expected to be volume-intensive over the next several years and we have to consider if we want to gear up for that or whether we just want to stick with the macro-sites, which we traditionally built and worked on; 5G is on the horizon, a re-pack of the commercial television stations, and the development of FirstNet, an LTE system for first responders across the coun- try. So, there are a lot of things in the works right now that will be impacting our business. I do expect us to remain heavily involved in tower construction and tower modification. We will do a little bit of the broadcast re-pack for the shorter towers in our area. And we will continue to be involved with the maintenance of macro sites. I don’t think I’m very interested in the small cell and DAS deployments.” However, as Anthony considers retiring from the family-owned business he founded with Preferred vendor n Mid-Atlantic Drilling www.midatlanticdrilling.com his wife almost 34 years ago, and passing on its day-to-day responsibilities to his son, he still re- mains passionately interested in the continuing need for the training and safety of tower indus- try professionals. “I spend most of my time as an advocate for improving the safety and train- ing and professionalism of the industry,” he says. He is a charter member of NATE– the National Association of Tower Erectors – and an Execu- tive Board Member of TIRAP- The Telecommu- nications Industry Registered Apprenticeship Program, which is a joint venture of telecom- munications companies, industry associations, and the U.S. Department of Labor. TIRAP de- velops apprenticeship programs available to qualified employers for career development of the telecommunications workforce. Its mis- sion is to partner with stakeholders to promote safety, enhance quality, and enable education and advancement opportunities in the telecom- munications workforce that will meet network infrastructure build-out needs. As always, at Shenandoah Tower Service, safety comes first.