Verizon is on plan to deploy five times as many 5G radio base stations this year as it did last year, according to CEO Hans Vestberg. The operator is also, in some cases, ahead of plan but it is encountering permitting or other delays in some municipalities, he said at a digital investor conference.

Some of Verizon's goals, however, are mired in ambiguity. Verizon has repeatedly said it will have nationwide 5G available before the end of this year. Verizon's 5G mobile service is commercially available in 30 cities today and it plans to reach 60 cities before the end of the year, Vestberg said.

The United States has roughly 20,000 incorporated cities and more than 300 U.S. cities have populations greater than 100,000 people. 

Dynamic spectrum sharing (DSS), a technology that allows operators to use the same spectrum for 4G LTE and 5G on a demand-generated and automated basis, will be the final piece of that nationwide footprint. Verizon plans to deploy the technology later this year. 

“Our goal for this year is more than 60 cities, five times more radio base stations, and then 10 mobile edge compute centers, 10 cities with 5G home, and then launching nationwide,” Vestberg laid out for Verizon's plans. 

He also, perhaps in a nod to its spectrum position and near-term reliance on DSS for nationwide 5G availability, downplayed the initial performance that customers will experience on its 5G network. “In the beginning you’re going to see some improvements — over time, dramatic improvements,” he said. 

“In the beginning it’s going to be small but then we all need to remember how technology works,” Vestberg said, noting that early instances of 4G LTE base stations could only reach small groups of people and top speeds of about 20 Mb/s. 

“The evolution of the technology and the software is, of course, going to drive much more improvements on the different spectrum over time as well,” he explained.

That outlook, however, doesn’t address Verizon’s need for mid-band spectrum. The operator is widely expected to bid for mid-band spectrum in the C-Band auction schedule to kick off in December, but that won’t fill any short-term needs. 

Satellite operators are incentivized to clear that spectrum in allotments by the fall of 2021 and 2023, respectively, but if those incentives aren’t met the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) doesn’t expect the 280 megahertz of spectrum to be available until September 2025. The C-band includes spectrum between the 3.7 and 4.2 GHz bands.