Vodafone Group and Orange signed a new mobile and fixed network sharing agreement in Spain, strengthening an existing deal and also enabling faster deployment of 5G over a wider geographic area.

In a statement, Vodafone said the deal “establishes a more economically efficient investment model for future network deployment, is more environmentally sensitive and will bring the benefit of more rapid 5G adoption to the Spanish economy”.

The original network sharing agreement covered passive infrastructure nationwide and active infrastructure in smaller towns. First signed in 2006, it was renewed in 2012 and 2016.

Vodafone said the new agreement covers active network sharing (both radio access and high-speed backhaul) in cities with populations up to 175,000 people: previously, this was only possible in towns of between 1,000 and 25,000 people. Two-thirds of the Spanish population will be covered by the new shared network, with 14,800 sites expected to be shared versus 5,600 today.

The operators will continue to run independent infrastructure in the biggest cities and will retain separate management of spectrum rights; network performance; control and functionality of respective core networks; and new product and service development.

Their deal also has a fixed element: Vodafone said it expands its previous FTTH wholesale arrangements “on attractive economic and technical terms”, and Vodafone will be able to expand its fibre and convergent services offer to an additional 1 million premises, increasing the footprint to more than 23 million homes.

Both companies have also agreed to look into expanding the fibre footprint through FTTH co-investment.