Crown Castle Inc.

Only mode. Should you need assistance, please signal a conference specialist by pressing the star key followed by zero. After today's presentation, there will be an opportunity to ask questions. To ask a question, you may press star, then one on your telephone keypad, and to withdraw from the question queue, you may press star, then two. As a reminder, this conference is being recorded. I would now like to hand the call to Chris Hinson, Vice President, Corporate Finance and Treasurer. Please go ahead.

Thank you, MJ, and good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us today as we discuss our first quarter 2024 results. With me on the call are Rob Bartolo, Crown Castle's board chair, Steve Moskowitz, Crown Castle's recently appointed president and chief executive officer, Tony Malone, Crown Castle's former interim president and chief executive officer, and Dan Schlinger, Crown Castle's chief financial officer. To aid the discussion, we have posted supplemental materials in the investor section of our website at crowncastle.com that will be referenced throughout the call this afternoon. This conference call will contain forward-looking statements which are subject to certain risks, uncertainties, and assumptions, and actual results may vary materially from those expected. Information about potential factors which could affect our results is available in the press release and the risk factor sections of the company's SEC filings. Our statements are made as of today, April 17th, 2024, and we assume no obligation to update any forward-looking statements. In addition, today's call includes discussions of certain non-GAAP financial measures. Tables reconciling these non-GAAP financial measures are available in the supplemental information package in the investor section of the company's website at crowncastle.com. With that, let me turn the call over to Rob.

Thanks, Chris, and good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining us. I would like to start by welcoming our new CEO, Steven Moskowitz. As you know, the CEO Search Committee, along with the full board, has been actively engaged in a robust process to find our next leader. We worked with Russell Reynolds and evaluated a number of talented and highly qualified candidates. Ideally, we were looking for someone with strong operating experience in the tower industry, a track record of strategic capital allocation and value creation, as well as prior CEO experience. This process has resulted in the unanimous view of both the CEO search committee and the full board that Stephen is the ideal person to lead Crown Castle going forward. A 25-year industry veteran, Stephen is a proven executive with deep tower operating experience. Stephen spent 12 years at American Tower, including the last seven years as EVP and president of the U.S. tower business. During his tenure, American Tower's U.S. operations became the largest and most profitable U.S. wireless infrastructure company, tripling in size to more than 20,000 cell sites. After American Tower, Stephen served as the CEO of NextG Networks, a provider of fiber-based small cell solutions. At NextG, Stephen produced market-leading returns on invested capital while increasing the asset base to approximately 10,000 nodes. Most recently, Stephen served as CEO of Centennial Towers, where he created a leading provider of build-to-suit cell sites in Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico by focusing on prudent capital allocation and operational excellence. As I've gotten to know Stephen, it's clear that his experience and capabilities in the areas of operational efficiency, process improvement, capital allocation, and his proven ability to build strong leadership teams will serve our customers, shareholders, and employees extremely well. We are excited to welcome Steven and believe his leadership will enable Crown Castle to effectively execute on its strategic and operating plans and grow value for all shareholders. I would also like to thank Tony Malone for serving as our interim CEO for the past three months. With the help of Tony's leadership, the company remains on track to meet its 2024 financial and operating goals and is well prepared for a seamless transition to Stephen as the company's next CEO. I'm going to turn the call over to Stephen in a few minutes to introduce himself and say a few words. But as you can imagine, after starting in the job late last week, he won't be in a position to take your questions at this time. But before I turn the call over to Stephen, I would like to provide an interim update on our fiber review process. As you know, in January, the board created a committee to direct a strategic and operating review of the company's fiber business with the goal of enhancing and unlocking shareholder value. The board engaged financial advisors, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America, as well as strategic and operating advisors, Altman Salon, as well as another leading management consulting firm to assess our businesses, core capabilities, competitive positioning, and organizational structure and also to perform market analysis and operational benchmarking. The goal of these assessments was to determine how to optimize the company's enterprise fiber and small-cell businesses and determine the fit, value, and synergies both inside and outside of Crown Castle. As it relates to the overarching conclusion, this review confirmed that we have premier assets in attractive markets throughout the U.S., The next step was to determine the optimal path to maximizing the value of these assets, both within and or outside of Crown Castle. To help assess the potential value creation opportunities, we have recently engaged with multiple parties who have expressed interest in a potential transaction involving all or part of our fiber business. These discussions are ongoing. While we will not comment further on these discussions during the call, We are excited to have Steven on board to help us think through our strategic alternatives. We believe his extensive experience in the digital infrastructure sector will be extremely beneficial throughout this process. Regarding our operational review, we have concluded our work with our external consultants. The main conclusion is that they believe there are opportunities for operational improvement in both our enterprise fiber and small cell businesses, regardless of the outcome of our strategic review. We have begun sharing these insights with Steven who will work with the board and the executive team to develop a revised operating plan that he will share with investors when appropriate. I speak on behalf of the board by saying how pleased we are to have concluded our CEO search with the appointment of such a talented and proven tower executive, as well as progressing substantially on our fiber review. We are laser focused as a board and moving rapidly yet methodically on these initiatives that we laid out in late December. To reiterate what I said earlier, we believe Stephen is the person best suited to lead Crown Castle through the next stages of our fiber review, as well as position the company for long-term success and value creation. We look forward to providing further updates as appropriate. Before I turn the call over to Stephen, I would like to say thank you to the talented employees at Crown Castle for continuing to serve our customers and deliver on the financial results we guided to for 2024. I'm impressed by your dedication and capability to stay focused even during these times of uncertainty. With that, let me turn it over to Stephen.