JBG SMITH Bringing 5G to Northern Virginia’s National Landing
By Keith Loria September 22, 2020 9:31 am
reprints
As part of an initiative to establish National Landing as one of the first 5G hubs in the U.S., JBG Smith (JBGS) has acquired seven blocks of Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) spectrum for $25.3 million through a national auction.
The purchase included four Priority Access Licenses (PAL) totaling 40 MHz in Arlington and three PALs (30 MHz) in Alexandria and spans more than 16.2 million square feet in National Landing—the home of Amazon HQ2 and Virginia Tech’s innovation campus—and Potomac Yard.
“JBG SMITH’s acquisition of CBRS spectrum is part of our larger goal to transform National Landing into an innovation district with robust technology and world-class infrastructure,” Evan Regan-Levine, JBG SMITH’s executive vice president of strategic innovation and research, told Commercial Observer. “This represents an important step in cultivating that environment and will help facilitate our efforts to roll out 5G with our telecom partners.”
The company envisions the area as what it calls a “canvas for innovation” for industry clusters such as defense and cybersecurity, cloud/edge computing, internet of things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI).
“Delivering ubiquitous 5G is an important component of our National Landing placemaking efforts,” Regan-Levine said. “While we are actively in conversations with partners to advance this goal in the medium term, our acquisition will allow us to offer our tenants the opportunity to broadcast over private networks on CBRS in the near future.”
The technology infrastructure will allow enterprises to connect everything and everyone in real time and transform customer engagement and experiences in National Landing.
“Connectivity has increasingly become a differentiating factor in real estate,” Regan-Levine said. “We’re investing heavily in developing and deploying a robust, redundant, and dense fiber network alongside 5G CBRS, and the DAS infrastructure that distributes connectivity through buildings. These investments together will enhance National Landing’s digital capabilities and provide our current and future customers with the cutting-edge connectivity tools that will enable them to grow and innovate.”
