We looked at Telstra's Small Cells some years back. While they were 4G only or 3G/4G back in those days, now small cells are also being talked about for 5G.
On their Q&A page on small cells, Telstra has explained what they mean by them. In fact we also wrote about how Telstra is using small cells to do EME testing here.
In their investor day this earlier this month, Telstra presented their T25 vision and the role of small cells in that. During the last three years, they’ve been talking about the journey of transformation that they have called T22. T22 was a strategy of necessity – a strategy designed to transform every aspect of Telstra. The new T25 strategy is being billed as a strategy for growth, which they have broken down into four pillars:
Provide an exceptional customer experience you can count on
Provide leading network and technology solutions that deliver your future
Create sustained growth and value for our shareholders
Be the place you want to work
As you can see in the slide above, Pillar 2 of their T25 strategy is focused on leading network and technology solutions that deliver the future. As they describe in their analyst day notes:
There is no doubt we are continuing to see rapid technology adoption and innovation. This is manifesting as a convergence between core telecommunications technology and software-based technology solutions.
What this means is that Telstra not only needs to continue to lead in telecommunications technology with the best networks, but also increasingly lead in the role that software plays in orchestrating and managing the network and integrating applications and services for customer solutions.
Under T25 we will continue to invest in our network leadership in 5G with 95% population coverage and 80% of all mobile network traffic being on 5G by FY25. We also plan to double the number of metro sites leveraging small cell technologies to further densify and add capacity to the network and we will add at least another 100,000 square kilometres of mobile coverage to our national footprint to support regional and remote customers.
By FY24 we will have extended our 4G coverage to 100% of our network enabling us to continue to lead in composite coverage, speed and performance for 4G and 5G as we close 3G. This will set us up well for the early planning on 6G which will clearly be on the agenda by the end of our T25 program.
We will be a vastly different company because of our network leadership with 95% 5G population coverage, a densified small cell network and expanded regional coverage.
Hopefully, the end users will be the real winners with these network upgrades.
Bigbelly claims to be the world leader of smart waste and recycling solutions for public spaces. According to their website, they have a proven solution that has been deployed in 50 countries around the globe. When the company started back in 2003, the mission was to transform one of the least efficient and resource heavy operations - waste operations. Today, Bigbelly provides a public right-of-way platform to deliver smart solutions and host communications infrastructure.
Earlier this year, they announced that Telebelly, an integrated pole and antenna solution that expands the Bigbelly station’s service by offering enhanced wireless services to the communities it serves, is set to boost connectivity across UK cities following its decision to launch. The press release said:
The move is expected to accelerate growth of the UK’s small cell network, which is a series of small antennas attached to existing urban infrastructure within densely populated areas. It will also pave the way for 5G by making it easier for telecommunication companies to deploy a faster and more reliable service without relying on large-scale mast installations.
Telebelly, which is 4G and 5G capable, will also reduce visual clutter associated with the growing number of small cells currently secured externally to fixed structures such as streetlights, as it is securely and internally housed.
Bigbelly anticipates interest in Telebelly from UK local authorities, which are seeking solutions for their public spaces that utliise, wherever possible, existing or multi-purpose infrastructure.
Councils, mobile network operators and other third parties are now able to consider the existing 2,500 Bigbelly units in operation across the UK, as well as new locations, for potential Telebelly sites. Wherever a public waste bin is appropriate, a Telebelly may be the solution to hide small cells in plain sight.
Meanwhile their press release in Australia announced:
Today Bigbelly Solar, Cellular Asset Management Services, and Smartsensor Technologies, Bigbelly distributor in Australia, announce they have deployed a number of Telebelly Wireless cabinets, a hybrid telecom and waste management cabinet to benefit the community providing waste services and wireless coverage.
Bigbelly Solar says this is a global first, with Blackman Park in the municipality of Lane Cove being the first one in the world to go live.
The Lane Cove council commented: “Lane Cove has been using Bigbelly compacting waste bins successfully in the community to help provide more capacity and a cleaner environment compared to conventional litter bins. The integration of this solution with mobile connectivity allows us to additionally provide much needed mobile service in currently underserved locations.”
Bigbelly Solar says the benefit of these units is that they blend in with the surrounding environment and matches the recognisable form of an adjacent big belly waste bin.
Not only does the community benefit from the increased mobile coverage footprint, each new Telebelly station now features a Bigbelly high capacity solar-powered waste compactor, complete with hands-free capabilities.
In addition to providing 4G voice and data services, the Telebelly could also be configured to provide Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity and Wi-Fi. A strong and reliable wireless connectivity not only provides a telecom advantage; such a service improves safety and security around public spaces.
Telecommunications have played an integral part during the recent Covid-19 crisis, allowing Australians to continue to work from home and stay connected with friends and family.
For those living in areas with limited coverage due to topography, small infrastructure solutions allow mobile operators to utilise public spaces such as parks and community ovals with coverage while also providing waste solution for the community’s benefit. Bigbelly Solar says these smaller solutions will reduce congestion on the network thus allowing mobile operators to provide mobile coverage in homes and businesses.
Meanwhile in the USA, where their Smart Waste & Recycling solution has been deployed in all 50 states, they deployed Telebelly small solutions in Milwaukee last year. Their blog post says:
The City of Milwaukee first connected with Bigbelly when a major wireless carrier reached out regarding siting challenges ahead of a significant event in the area. The event was fast approaching, and the city required a solution to host small cell in those central, inevitably high-traffic locations. The City looked to solve the all-too-common problem of hiding small cell infrastructure in a manner with the least visual impact. In other words: their complex technology needed to hide in plain sight.
Like many central locations, these high-traffic downtown areas were deemed to be “aesthetically sensitive.” Project approval was fully contingent on the Telebelly’s concealment solution: its ability to be compact, efficient, safe, and self-effacing.
The City was excited about the Telebelly’s multipurpose capabilities, such as small cell hosting, smart waste, IT hosting and more. But most importantly, Milwaukee was intrigued by the Telebelly’s ubiquitous form factor; its simple & understated aesthetic is inherently non-intrusive. This was essential to their form factor challenge.
Within six months of the initial conversation with the wireless carrier, the Telebellies were installed and ready to go! Already, both wireless carriers and the City are thrilled with the installation & performance of their new fleet, and assert that the Telebelly units are an excellent solution for areas which are traditionally difficult to permit.
Readers of this blog will no doubt be aware of many different solutions for both the scenarios listed above, coverage and capacity, that I have covered over the years with similar solutions. It remains to be seen how operators and councils embrace it.
Embedded below is a detailed video from them from Smart Cities Week 2020, discussing "Smart Alternatives to Small Cell Deployment":
Fixed Wireless is a hot topic, especially with 5G. We made a tutorial on that back in 2018, available here. While there are many different CPEs (Customer Premises Equipments) available, for the big players as well as the smaller ones, Nokia's FastMile caught my attention.
The Australian operator Optus has been selling and promoting the FastMile solution for FWA in Aus. You can see a lot of unboxing videos on YouTube, one nice one here.
There are couple of solutions available. In our tutorial, we talk about a combined CPE + router in a box and a separate CPE whose output is connected to a router. Nokia has a solution for both of these.
The FastMile 5G Gateways (link) is the combined CPE + router. The video below shows how it works.
The FastMile 5G Receiver on the other hand is just a 5G CPE whose output is then connected to a router to create a hotspot. The video below sort of explains it:
Nokia is enjoying reasonable success with FastMile which can be seen from some of their announcements on the web. One such embedded as Tweet below:
Optus received the distinguished award for its Satellite Small Cell in a Container. Optus designed the standalone, autonomously-powered solution to extend the Optus mobile network, using Optus' satellite backhaul service, into remote regional and rural sites where other telecommunications facilities, infrastructure and power are unavailable. Nick Leake, Acting Head of Satellite Networks, said Optus is committed to decreasing the digital divide in geographically challenging locations. “We are investing significantly in regional and remote areas across Australia. Our Satellite Small Cell in a Container is a fantastic example of how Optus continues to innovate our satellite solutions to provide resilient mobile connectivity to communities in geographically challenging locations.” Optus was the first in Australia to deliver satellite small cells, enabling 3G mobile coverage and extending the Optus mobile network into remote, rural and regional locations using Optus’ satellite backhaul service. Mataranka National Park in the Northern Territory was the first site to benefit from the Satellite Small Cell in a Container, with ten additional sites in the Northern Territory, South Australia and Western Australia currently being built, tested and rolled out.
I blogged about the Australian mobile notspots program earlier here and Parallel Wireless CWS Radios helping Optus connect Australian outback via satellite here. This Optus deployment won Small Cell Forum award in 'Excellence in Commercial Deployment of Rural/Remote Small Cells' category in 2017 along with Parallel Wireless for their CWS & Gilat for satellite backhaul.
Vodafone Australia has unveiled its new technology for helping improve mobile signal for voice, data, and Internet of Things (IoT) in regional areas, with its Vodafone Regional Coverage Hub. The Hub is a simple, self-install, small cells solution. It relies on ethernet backhaul for connectivity with the operator network.
ZDNet reports that this has been developed in partnership with Nokia. Nokia has a similar solution called Kuha that they have trialed in UK.
Vodafone press release mentions that this hub was able to provide coverage for 8 sq. km., which is roughly 1.5 km radius. Its a low power solution so coverage area would be restricted. The small cell is providing 4G and NB-IoT coverage.
Its interesting to note that as this is 4G only, older 4G devices and devices that do not support VoLTE will not work on this small cell.
Back in February, Telstra announced that they had turned on the 300th site as part of Federal Government’s Mobile Black Spots Program. The announcement said:
With hundreds of new base stations, small cells and site upgrades built over the last 6 months or scheduled around the country during the next 6 months, this financial year (FY18) is shaping up as a big year for expanding mobile coverage for regional Australia.
Then in March, it installed 4G small cells at 50 sites across the Melbourne CBD as part of a national three-year rollout of 1000 cells intended to boost capacity. As per RCR Wireless, Telstra’s small cell program stipulates the deployment of 1,000 small cells in metro and regional locations within the next three years. Some of these areas include Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.
Finally, another announcement in March indicated that Telstra is trialing small cells on Tasmania’s power poles to fix mobile black spots. As per this announcement:
We have announced we will trial the installation of small cell mobile technology on TasNetworks‘ electricity distribution infrastructure to help fill some of Tasmania’s mobile black spots. The small cells trial will begin with a single site in the Weldborough area, where a small cell installed on TasNetworks infrastructure will provide new mobile voice and broadband coverage. With the construction of a standard mobile base station typically costing several hundreds of thousands of dollars, small cells may allow us to deliver mobile coverage and capacity to smaller communities and areas where the construction of a mobile base station would otherwise be uneconomical. The trial will test the feasibility of using existing TasNetwork power poles to improve mobile coverage in parts of Tasmania.
Came across this Quora question recently, "Is Australia much bigger than it appears on the map?". The answer surprised me because Australia is as big as USA or China and is 3.5 times bigger that Greenland but in the map that certainly does not show up. With a population of just 23.2 million, it's definitely bound to have loads of not-spots.
Telstra's 4G small cells are connect Queensland's mobile blackspots, but lack of coverage is still common. The problem with low power small cells sometimes is that the coverage area can be very small. In this particular case its less than 300 metres.
Optus is another operator committed to spend AU$1 billion to in regional and rural Australia to eradicate mobile blackspots, improve overall mobile coverage outside the big cities and help future proof the networks for data-hungry applications like video streaming.
It's the biggest network investment in the company's 25-year history and will fund:
500 new mobile sites across regional and remote Australia (including 114 sites built through the government's Mobile Blackspots Program)
Upgrades for more than 1,800 sites to go from 3G to 4G
The addition of 4G to more than 200 sites (to increase capacity for peak periods)
The continued rollout of satellite small-cell technology (bringing voice and data to the remote outback)
I talked earlier about their 3G Small Cells using Parallel Wireless CWS here. The solution also won Small Cell Forum award in 'Excellence in Commercial Deployment of Rural/Remote Small Cells' category along with Gilat for satellite backhaul.
Here is a video showing how users reacted to one of the sites having just been turned on.
*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Senior Director, Strategic Marketing. This blog is maintained in my personal capacity and expresses my own views, not the views of my employer or anyone else. Anyone who knows me well would know this.
Optus, the second largest mobile operator in Australia is working hard to provide coverage to blackspots. According to their black spot program:
Under Round 2 of the Program, Optus successfully secured $26.4 million in Federal and State Government funding to build 114 new mobile sites, with Optus co-contributing a further $36.4 million to provide dedicated connectivity to thousands of Australians. Optus’ bid includes funding for 65 mobile base stations as well as the deployment of 49 satellite small cells.
William Creek, a town that is fifteen hours from Adelaide is one such place that recently got a small cell from Optus. One newspaper put it as:
All ten permanent residents of South Australia’s William Creek will get mobile coverage for the first time when Optus switches on its first base station subsidised under the federal government’s mobile blackspot program. The outback town is famed for having one of the world’s most remote pubs and the only petrol station between mining centres Maree, Coober Pedy, and Oodnadatta. It is surrounded by the world’s largest cattle station, Anna Creek, which spans some 24,000 square kilometres. However, it is also frequented by a number of tourists passing through the village as they explore the famous Oodnadatta Track or stop over on their way to Lake Eyre, which is about 1000 km away. Visitors - as long as they are Optus customers - will now enjoy 3G mobile reception in town rather than having to rely on one of William Creek’s solar powered pay phones. Optus, which was conspicuously left out of the first $100 million round of the mobile blackspot subsidy program, has installed a satellite small cell in the centre of town, relying on both satellite connectivity and backhaul to deliver 3G mobile reception within a radius of three kilometres of the town.
Optus national planning manager Vince Mullins said William Creek's new technology was the result of an 18-month trial in Oodnadatta. "Unlike a normal mobile base station, which is quite expensive and large, we've shrunk that down and we're basically able to provide hot spot coverage in these really remote areas," he said. "To deploy, it's very quick, as opposed to building a massive tower, and it's great because we can use satellite technology to backhaul it rather than having to run microwave or fibre." Optus, the South Australian and Federal governments have invested $8.5 million to improve mobile coverage across regional and remote areas in the state. More than a dozen other remote locations will also see similar technology soon.
In a news item in January in Telecom Times, Optus had said:
"Our primary vendor for this project is Gilat," an Optus spokesperson told Telecom Times. "Through our relationship with Gilat we also work with Parallel Wireless, who are providing the mobile related equipment and technology for the rollout, such as small cells and mobile network gateways."
The Small Cell Forum recently launched its Release 5: Rural & Remote to address the growing concern of especially rural coverage that is plaguing many developed nations.
The release contains 16 new and updated documents ranging from case studies of small cells already used in a range of rural and remote settings, through to those covering backhaul, deployment challenges, architectures and the services that can be enabled by small cells.
From my point of view, backhaul is one of the biggest challenge for the rural and remote coverage. As I have discussed in an earlier post here, satellites are a good option for rural small cells. The main issue with satellites is latency which could be around 0.5 seconds which may make them unsuitable for voice and other real time applications. Another option being trialled are Balloons and Drones as I have discussed in another post here.
The Australian operator Telstra is rolling out small cells in around 50 rural areas. While the small cells would be good for 4G data, they wouldnt be available for voice. While I do not have the details on what backhaul they are using and the voice issues could be more of VoLTE support on handsets, I am sure the users would appreciate the data coverage. If latency is not an issue then they could use OTT services like Skype, Whatsapp, Viber for voice.
The UK operator EE has been working with Parallel Wireless to use innovative mesh backhauling. Part of the licensed spectrum (20MHz chunk of EE‘s 1800MHz LTE spectrum) could be used for backhaul which would be different from the access network for the end users. The meshing allows in theory for the small cell to macro connection, with a couple of hops, be as much as 30km.
As I have mentioned in a post earlier, Vodafone UK has its own Rural Sure Signal program. Vodafone claims to have received hundreds of applications from communities across the length and breadth of the UK. Following a trial covering 12 towns and villages, it has now announced the first 30 communities selected to join the programme, which it is hoped will enhance everyday life for consumers and make it easier to do business in rural areas. There is a plan to continue this program for the rest of this year.
ThinkSmallCell has an interesting article where it asks if the drive towards the rural coverage is operator driven or regulator mandated. While it is a combination of both is most developed countries, in some developing nations it can just be that people are desperate and will find their own way. One example is people in remote villages in Mexico that are installing open source base stations from NuRAN to provide coverage to their villages. Another example is Nepal, where villagers are banding together to provide WiFi coverage to rural areas.
Opensource is another concept argues ThinkSmallCell that may also be an opportunity to connect some of the most remote and unserved communities which commercial organisations haven't been able to reach. It may also be useful for experiments and for colleges and universities with limited budgets. PA consultants have shown how to create a 2G base station using Raspberry-Pi. I have a feeling that we will see more projects like these soon.
