Comba Telecom Helps Bring Open RAN to New Markets

Comba Telecom is a global leading wireless solutions provider with their own R&D facilities, manufacturing base, and sales and service teams. The company offers a comprehensive suite of products and services including wireless access, wireless enhancement, antenna and subsystems and wireless transmission to its global customers. Comba's core product portfolio includes antennas and subsystems and network products (DAS, Small Cells, Repeater, RRU, etc.), offering turnkey solutions for indoor and outdoor 2G/3G/4G/Wifi/5G to their global customers.

Last year, Comba announced the launch of the industry's first Open RAN multi-RAT, multi-band Remote Radio Unit (“RRU”) that supports 1800MHz and 2100MHz, promoting widespread adoption of emerging open standards in the globe. The announcement says:

The RRU is designed to minimize the total cost of ownership (“TCO”) for operators and neutral hosts in macro deployments through fast and easy deployment, energy savings, improved coverage and throughput, smaller footprint and easy maintenance. Engineered for efficient high power (320W) operation, the multi-RAT multi-band 4T4R RRU minimizes the environmental footprint and reduces the energy spend for the operator. 

As a first in the Open RAN industry the GSM/UMTS/LTE/5G NR multi-mode operation makes it ideal for simple upgrades of legacy sites without compromises. The 4T4R radio supports two LTE/5G NR carriers per band and Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (“DSS”). This enables operators to serve arising 5G traffic demand without additional spectrum or removing LTE service.

Comba has a long-standing collaboration with major industry partners and alliances and has participated in the initial Open RAN trials and lab projects in different regions. With all in-house expertise in interoperability and optimizing radio designs for market specific criteria, Comba enables mobile operators to accelerate time to market, and mitigate the overall technology risk when adopting to Open RAN strategy in their next generation of RAN. 

A recent video looks at these Open RAN Multi-band RRUs

While most Open RAN RUs are focused on 4G & 5G, Comba's radios work on 2G & 3G as well. This has allowed them to bring Open RAN solutions to many different parts of the world that may not be ready for 5G yet. Some of these include announcements with their software partner Parallel Wireless in Latin America and Indonesia. Another recent standalone announcement included one with Turkcell in Turkey.

Telefonica also listed them as one of the partners in a presentation at MWC

Operator Watch Blog: Telefonica's Vision of Open RAN from MWC 2022 - https://t.co/iTYJDGx1MQ via Maite Aparicio, Head of Open RAN-Global CTIO#3G4G5G #OperatorWatch #4G #5G #Telefonica #OpenRAN #ORAN #ORANalliance #NEC #Altiostar #Intel #Comba #Airspan #SuperMicro #Dell #RedHat pic.twitter.com/pE4OpsRTmD

— 3G4G (@3g4gUK) April 6, 2022

Telecom Infra Project's TIP Exchange features quite a few radios from Comba which you can see here.

If you are interested in learning more, what the Comba keynote and Panel Discussion on Maturity of Open RAN Adoption at MWC22 Open RAN Summit below:

Related Posts:

• Telecoms Infrastructure Blog: Vodafone Portugal's “streetlamp”
• Operator Watch Blog: Telefonica's Vision of Open RAN from MWC 2022
• The 3G4G Blog: Open RAN Terminology and Players
• Telecoms Infrastructure Blog: Open RAN (O-RAN) RRU (O-RU) and DU (O-DU) Design
• The 3G4G Blog: A quick tutorial on Open RAN, vRAN & White Box RAN
• The 3G4G Blog: Open RAN Explanation, Videos, White papers and Other Resources
• The 3G4G Blog: O-RAN Introduction for Beginners
• Telecoms Infrastructure Blog: NTT Docomo's 5G Network is based on 'Open RAN' Principles
• Telecoms Infrastructure Blog: NTT Docomo's 5G RAN Infrastructure
• The 3G4G Blog: 5G RAN Functional Splits
• The 3G4G Blog: From traditional RAN to Open RAN - O-RAN: Goals and Challenges
• 3G4G: Open RAN, OpenRAN and O-RAN 

Optus 'Satellite Small Cell in a Container' wins another award

Optus has won the Satellite Provider of the Year award at Communications Alliance’s 2018 ACOMM Awards dinner.

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.


Further Reading:

• Out of the way not out of touch
• Regional Victoria's black spot boost
• Optus switches on 50th Mobile Black Spot site in Parawa

Internet para todos: Telefonica and Parallel Wireless on a mission to connect 100 Million Unconnected

According to GSMA Intelligence report, 'The Mobile Economy Latin America and the Caribbean 2017':

Latin America has seen rapid growth in the number of mobile internet subscribers over recent years, with a total of nearly 350 million, registering growth of almost 10% since the start of 2016. Of these subscribers, more than two thirds connect to the internet via mobile broadband (3G or 4G) networks. As the importance of digital access and engagement increases, so this figure will continue to grow strongly, to reach about 420 million by 2020.

Despite the growth to date, only slightly more than half of the population currently ha0ve a mobile internet subscription, well below the developed market average of two thirds – though some lowerincome groups may connect using Wi-Fi only.

As a result, around 300 million people are digitally excluded and unable to enjoy the socioeconomic benefits that mobile internet can bring. By 2020, nearly two thirds of the population will be connected, still well behind the developed market average but in line with the global average. However, nearly 250 million people across the region will still be digitally excluded. There remain significant barriers to adoption, particularly for underserved population groups (rural, women, low income and youth).

Mobile internet penetration also varies significantly across the region. Chile had the highest penetration as at the end of 2016, with Argentina only slightly behind. In contrast, the Dominican Republic, Guatemala and Haiti have mobile internet penetration rates of one third or less (Cuba has among the lowest levels of mobile internet penetration globally, at 3% of the population). 

At MWC 2018, Telefónica announced “Internet para todos”, a collaborative project to connect the unconnected in Latin America. The Initiative is aimed at connecting the more than 100 million people in Latin America with no internet access. Telefónica also expanded its collaboration with Facebook on key technological and commercial innovations and collaboration with multiple stakeholders: rural operators, technology firms and regulators.

For those who are wondering what “Internet para todos” means, it means “Internet for all. Here is a good video on the initiative.



You can read all about it here. One of the vendors mentioned in this press release is Parallel Wireless (*). Their announcement on this is available here.

Embedded below is an indepth presentation on this topic by Patrick Lopez, VP, networks innovation at Telefónica.

Telefonica internet para todos from Patrick Lopez

And here is the video of above for anyone interested:


In the recent Small Cell Forum awards, 'Internet Para Todos' won the Social Impact award – Promoting Small Cells for Social/Economic/Environmental Development.

And the winner is...? ¡#InternetParaTodos!

Ganador del premio al impacto social del @SmallCell_Forum 🏆🏆

Nos sentimos orgullosos #SomosTelefónica pic.twitter.com/9dEo0ehBAh

— Telefónica (@Telefonica) May 25, 2018

ICYMI: Parallel Wireless & @Telefonica work to provide #Internetparatodos has won @SmallCell_Forum Social Impact award! (@Telefinnovation)https://t.co/PMqrZjgjBQ

— Parallel Wireless (@Parallel_tw) May 24, 2018

Hopefully we will see many more similar initiatives from other operators and TIP to connect the unconnected.

*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Senior Director in 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.

Meshing for BYOC (Bring Your Own Coverage)

Back in November, a Senior Designer from EE did a presentation on LTE-powered Emergency Services Network (ESN). There were some interesting slides in that. One is as shown in the picture above while the other is in the tweet below.

Vehicle mounted Small Cells will play a big role in Public Safety LTE networks. Here is our old post looking at @Parallel_tw in-vehicle small cells for #PSLTE - https://t.co/LMUR337CVJ #SmallCells #ESN pic.twitter.com/kXKRvNFeit

— 3G4G (@3g4gUK) January 31, 2018

Interestingly this is something I have also looked in an earlier post here.

Meshing functionality has been tried a few times before, it does not work in every case. One of the successful cases is the use of mesh links in backhaul.

Parallel Wireless just put out a small video on Bring Your Own Coverage (BYOC - though BYOC can mean a lot of different things) as follows:

I have also blogged about Parallel Wireless Rural solution that uses mesh links too here.

Related Post (added 23 March 2019)

• Update on UK's Emergency Services Network (ESN) from BAPCO 2019

*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Senior Director in 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.

Covering Australian Mobile Not-spots

Picture source

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.

Picture Source

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.

Drones, More Drones & Droneway

I have written about Drones and Balloons in the past, mainly to BT/EE. Take for instance this presentation by Mansoor Hanif at TIP Summit and this one on Flying Small Cells. In addition I have also talked about Telefonica's Nano cell, which is a small cell on a drone; Verizon's 'flying cell-site' and AT&T's flying COW.

This week the US operator Sprint announced that they are trialing their Magic boxes on drones. Here is a video on that:

Back in August, IEEE Spectrum ran an article on how Flying Cell Towers Could Aid Search and Rescue. Base stations carried by drones would form an ad hoc network and connect first responders.

Picture Source: IEEE Spectrum

From the IEEE Spectrum article:

An aerial communications system supported by drones could be deployed much faster and operate with minimal interference. In 2013, we started to think about what such a drone-based communications system for public safety agencies might look like. We knew it would need a shared radio-frequency channel for first responders, drone-portable base stations, a power supply, and a digital database for exchanging information. We would also need controllers that would be easy enough for a licensed drone pilot to operate in a crisis.

Our first major challenge was to find a base station small enough for a drone to support. Drones under 25 kilograms—the limit now imposed by U.S. air-safety regulators—can carry a maximum payload of about 2 kg, so we would need a base station that weighed less, even with its battery.

Finally, my search led me to a startup named Virtual Network Communications. This company, based in Chantilly, Va., sells a product called a GreenCell that seemed suitable. It’s a scalable LTE base station, known as a picocell, which is typically used to extend the reach of an existing network but can also generate its own network. The base station contains an E-UTRAN Node B radio with two antennas and a credit-card-size component called a Micro Evolved Packet Core, which uses LTE technology to form an ad hoc network with nearby radios. Then, that local network connects to a nationwide cellular network.

With these components, our GreenCell can support communications for up to 128 users at a time from a distance of up to about 2 kilometers on any LTE frequency. Better yet, it measures just 12.5 by 12.5 centimeters and weighs only 2 kg with its battery, just light enough to be lifted by a drone.

Once we had found a suitable base station, we still needed to find a suitable drone. Ideally, it would be affordable and be capable of flying for 10 to 12 hours before needing a recharge. Unfortunately, no such drone exists today. Most commercial drones can stay aloft for fewer than 45 minutes.

After some research, I found a company named CyPhy Works, which has developed a drone powered through a 150-meter cord that extends up from a grid or generator. Technically, this drone could stay in the air for as long as it had access to a power supply on the ground. But in a disaster scenario, it would have to be tethered to a van loaded with a generator and fuel. That would limit it to serving the same road-accessible places to which mobile units already travel. Another drawback: The drone’s tether restricts its mobility once it’s in the air. We wanted to be able to reconfigure our network in an instant.

We briefly considered using balloons instead of drones, but we discovered through trial and error that balloons are difficult to reposition and hold in place, especially during high winds.

We decided instead to use the AR200 drone from AirRobot, a company based in Arnsberg, Germany. The AR200 has six rotors that allow it to hover more steadily than the usual four. And because the AirRobot drone is battery powered, it can zoom off to any location.

In summer, Qualcomm unveiled [PDF report] the results of a months-long drone trial program, which found LTE networks today already provide the aerial connectivity necessary to support commercial unmanned aerial vehicle deployments. But the tech giant noted some network optimizations will be necessary to take drone deployments to new heights. As per their blog post:

During the field trial, approximately 1,000 flights were performed to collect datasets that were post processed and analyzed. We also performed simulations to complement field trial results by allowing study of performance tradeoffs when the network is serving many mobile devices and LTE-connected drones simultaneously over a wide area. Simulations also enabled rapid testing of parameter and feature changes that are more difficult to study in a commercial network.

The field trial demonstrated that LTE networks can support safe drone operation in real-world environments. Our findings showed that existing commercial cellular networks can provide coverage to drones at low altitudes up to 400 feet AGL. Our test drones also showed seamless handovers between different base stations during flights. Below is a glimpse of these findings.

According to Mobile World Live,

The head of AT&T’s Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAV) business development team said the operator is working with regulatory authorities and standards organisations to “unlock” the potential of drones.

Speaking with Mobile World Live, Greg Belaus said many tests of drones on cellular networks so far have been conducted at a height of 400 feet. In the US, Belaus explained that airspace is governed by the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) Part 107 rules. Belaus said “a lot of work” on drones right now is focused on what needs to be done to open that area for drone services.

There is an interesting AT&T Flying COW presentation on Youtube for anyone interested, here.

#DronemanGhoshy is creating the world's first "Droneway" like you have Motorways and Railways! pic.twitter.com/4HBMGYrrmk

— Ayan Ghosh (@DronemanGhoshy) September 11, 2017

Finally, looks like "Droneway" may be becoming a reality soon. As one of the partners involved in the project, I may not be at a liberty to say much but this photo of the article below (click to expand) provides an idea 😊

*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.

Rural Small Cells: An end user story

At the end of a recent seminar on small cells (without mentioning any details) someone from the organising team asked me (as they know me well), "we keep on hearing that small cells can make a huge difference but when will it start making that difference?". I am glad to say that I can share one such video that shows how small cells are making huge differences.

I am cross posting this video from Parallel Wireless Blog. This is a story of a couple, who are both retired doctors based in a village near Halifax in England, UK.


There are many other similar stories that we have come across, not just in UK but many other countries where rural small cells are making huge differences in communities by not only providing connectivity but also by making quality of life much better.

According to this ITU report, 53% of the world’s population is still offline, with the majority located in Africa and Asia-Pacific. This means there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to #ConnectTheUnconnected

*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.

Small Cell Forum Awards 2017 Winners

The Small Cells Forum (SCF) Awards 2017 were recently held as part of Small Cells World Summit. The Small Cell Industry Awards are a recognized badge of excellence and innovation with a panel of impartial judges – comprised of analysts, journalists and industry experts – ensure the independence and quality of the awards. Its one of the few awards that I really respect for its impartiality.

The award nominees can be viewed here and the winners are here. The photographs are available here. I have covered some of the winners as part of this blog so I am listing those posts below.

Parallel Wireless & Gilat Parallel Wireless and Gilat Connecting the Unconnected in the Outback - I wrote this post 'Small Cells to help connect Australian Outback'. There is a very good video, unfortunately cant be embedded on this news item here.

Parallel Wireless Removing Deployment Constraints of Small Cell vRAN and 5G HetNets - I have not directly covered this topic, but will do soon. This post from last year 'HetNets On The Bus' gives an idea on how the HetNet Gateway (HNG) removes deployment constraints and future proof the network. Interested readers can find more detailed info on Parallel Wireless website here.

Vodafone CrowdCell: Using Macro Radio Network to Backhaul Open-Access Small Cells - I have covered this as part of 'Small Cells at Mobile World Congress 2017' and earlier 'Vehicular CrowdCell or Vehicular Small Cell and the 5G plan'

BT & EE EE Air Mast Using Small Cells - This is my favourite as I was personally involved in this activity. I have two posts on this one. The first one is 'Flying Small Cells are here...' and the second one is 'Connecting Rural Scotland using Airmasts and Droneways'. I have to admit that this is a very ambitious project, especially the second one.

*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Solutions Architect. 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.

Small Cells to help connect Australian Outback

Picture Source: William Creek Hotel on Facebook

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."

Related Links:

• Optus Mobile Black Spot Program
• Optus ups WA mobile coverage with new small cells along 2,000 km highway
• Mobile Operators in Australia - Wikipedia
• Optus’ first blackspot base station connects all ten residents of William Creek
• Filling in Mobile Blackspots brings Facebook to a remote pub in South Australia
• Outback town William Creek enters 21st century with mobile reception

Small Cells at Mobile World Congress 2017 (#MWC17)

Mobile World Congress was big and busy, as always. There were lots of interesting demos, technologies and much more. While I was only able to look at a few demos, here is my summary of the small cells related info that I managed to see or came across on social media.

Ericsson and Philips have been working together for a while so its no surprise they were showing their new connected street lighting model. You can see this from my picture above.

Disruption at the network edge panel: @sprintnews densifying its network with thousands of small cells #mwc17 pic.twitter.com/daFoMUCz0a

— CCS (@CCS_multipoint) March 1, 2017

Sprint has already mentioned earlier that they will be rolling out more small cells and they were conveying the same message at MWC. Their rival T-Mobile says that they have 1000 small cells right now but will have 5/6000 by the end of the year.

IP Access had a nice booth and it was good to see that their CEO Malcolm Gordon and CTO Nick Johnson both managed to get their message across that 2017 will probably be a big year for Small Cells.

Vodafone introduced the "CrowdCell" concept last year, this year they continued to build on that story. The CrowdCell uses macro for backhaul. I generally refer to this as In-band backhaul (IBBH) and have written about this here. While they have already shown Indoor CrowdCell and In-car CrowdCell before, this year they were showing the Flying CrowdCell. You can see a video of that here (in Spanish) and a non-flying version here. This is slightly similar to the Airmast concept by EE.

Hidden in a corner at the Vodafone booth was a pre-commercial quad band femto by Parallel Wireless. If you look at the form factor, its no different than a single band femto from couple of years back.

Parallel Wireless also had a presence on many of their partners booths (picture above from KMW booth). TMN magazine has a feature on them and I embed their video below.


China Unicom is deploying 500 Radio Dots from Ericsson in Beijing.

Cellnex was showing how their small cells could be used for Smart Cities and Urban deployments. They have recently signed contract with JCDecaux and expects to deploy between 200,000 and 500,000 small cells 🙃

Acceleran was showing small cells on 3.5GHz CBRS band.

The Indian mobile operator Reliance Jio, which recently set a record for fastest 100 million subscribers (in 170 days), will be deploying Airspan small cells. This should be a massive project for Airspan.

Finally, there were quite a few 5G conceptual demo's. The picture above is from Intel stand. Due to 5G not yet defined, people were either using 28GHz or 60GHz. Regardless of what they were demonstrating, they would claim it to be 5G.

Apologies to other vendors I have missed.

There were also some good presentations at the Small Cell Forum networking area. The link for them is below and I will also be sharing some more of them in the coming weeks.

Related links:

• Mobile World Congress 2017 Small Cell Event Report - ThinkSmallCell
• Speaker presentations from MWC - Small Cell Forum
• Look back and forecast of Small Cells
• Telecoms Infrastructure Blog: Flying Small Cells are here...

Flying Small Cells are here...

The UK mobile network operator EE has done a press release on 'Airmast technology for rural mobile coverage and disaster recovery'. The idea of having mobile base stations was first conceived by the previous CEO of EE, Olaf Swantee and then Director of RAN Mansoor Hanif in early 2015.

With the 4G small cells making it to the market in 2015/16, Mansoor brought in the  Ayan Ghosh (a.k.a. "Droneman") to lead the airmast project. While Parallel Wireless (PW) and Nokia had been actively working with EE, innovative solutions require innovative partners. This led to finding some very innovative solution providers, some of them based in the UK. Allsopp Helikites based for example is based in Salisbury who specialise in balloon deployments. Other partners included Voltserver with their smart digital power, Avanti with the satellite, UVue with their drones, Parallel Wireless with the Mesh 4G radio and Nokia with Smallcells were introduced to each other for collaboratively coming up with a solution.

The Helikite and Drone solutions are designed to provide temporary coverage not only in case of emergency but also in case of floods, power failures, fiber breaks, etc. They can also supplement the existing coverage in case of big festivals like Glastonbury, etc. In fact one of the example given by Marc Allera, CEO of EE was that anyone climbing a mountain where there may be a limited coverage can order 'coverage on demand' in future.

As part of the team to convert these innovative ideas into reality, we (Parallel Wireless) focused on small cell on the helikite with with tethered power, in-band backhaul (IBBH) and mesh link. The picture below will clarify what we have achieved.

In our case, the small cells worked in tandem with the HetNet Gateway (HNG) can self-configure and self-optimize the power, coverage, etc.

A more detailed slide from Mansoor Hanif's presentation at the Facebook TIP Summit can be seen below.

In fact to make this a success, there were many different components. Voltserver providing digital power that allows a thin cable to run along with the tether and power the small cell and other equipment on the Helikite. Having power to the helikite ensures that it can stay up for 2 - 4 weeks before being brought down to refill helium. Without this power source, 2 x 24V battery would last maybe an hour or two.

The Helikite itself by Allsopp helikites which are unique in their own way. A whitepaper by Aerostats All Australia (AAA) provides a nice comparison of different Aerostats and shows that Helikite performs better than other types, mainly in windy scenarios.

In addition to the Parallel Wireless solution, Nokia showed drones with and without the power tether and also satellite based backhaul, powered by Avanti.

From EE's press release:

EE’s breakthroughs in developing innovative aerial solutions have been achieved with the support of the most innovative partners from the mobile industry and beyond: Nokia has provided world class, lightweight, compact and portable Flexi Zone small cell basestation solutions; Parallel Wireless has delivered a unique technology with self-configuring and self-optimising basestation, in-band backhaul capability, and network meshing techniques; Avanti has enabled a fast, reliable satellite backhaul connection; VoltServer has provided touch-safe and flexible Digital Electricity power over data cable/tether; uVue has evolved drone designs to meet the specific requirements of providing mobile coverage; and Allsopp Helikites has provided the ‘Helikite’ solution that makes a stable, high altitude service possible.

The press release also notes that "EE’s tethered and powered mobile ‘air mast’ solutions are currently in patent-pending status."

Here is an interesting video from EE on how air masts will work:




My favourite picture is one posted by Mansoor Hanif on Linkedin after the first demo at BT, Madley.

Related links:

• EE Pioneers Air Mast Technology for Rural Mobile Coverage and Disaster Recovery
• Parallel Wireless and EE – Taking Small Cells to the Skies
• EE demonstrate innovative disaster recovery using small cells
• Some pictures from the EE showcase on Facebook

Related Blog Posts:

• The 3G4G Blog: An Introduction to Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN)
• Connectivity Technology Blog: TIP has launched 'Non-Terrestrial Connectivity Solutions' Group
• The 3G4G Blog: Connectivity on Planes
• The 3G4G Blog: Satellites & Non-terrestrial networks (NTN) in 5G

*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Solutions Architect. 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.

Small Cells' and 5G - Small Cell Forum Workshop

Small Cell Forum recently held a workshop on the role of small cells' in 5G. Each speaker had 10 minutes to present their view/vision. The presentations are available here and combined PDF embedded below.

Small Cells for Public Safety Communications

One of the many use cases for Small cells is for public safety communications. In case of emergency situations (earthquake, floods, terrorism, etc.) when the macro network is damaged or as it generally happens, the power supply is disrupted, small cells can quickly come in action and provide a coverage solution. This was discussed in an earlier post here.

Another scenario is when dedicated public safety coverage needs to be provided for hard to reach places or in a stadium kind if scenario, small cells be fill the void.

While in USA there is a dedicated band (Band 14 – 700MHz) available for use with public safety communications, most other countries do not rely on dedicated spectrum. In case there is no dedicated spectrum, there are still many different approaches to make sure that the personnel from emergency services can continue communication (as long as there is coverage available).

Parallel Wireless*, a Small Cells solution provider based in Nashua, NH, USA specializes in public safety and rural coverage solutions using small cells. The following slide pack contains some of their stories of deployments, demos and trials:

Further Reading:

• 5 Considerations for a Successful Public Safety LTE Deployment

*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Solutions Architect. 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.

Small Cells: Best solution for rural coverage?

I drive around the UK a great deal. While I rely mostly on my phone to call and message/text, I also use it to check tweets, Facebook, emails and most important of all as a Satnav (I'm a big fan of Waze). I often end up in scenarios where I have no coverage so a wrong turn results in my Satnav route failure. This can mean I have to drive around for miles before I can get back on route.

In most countries (including UK) when an operator mentions its coverage, its means population based coverage. The problem is that one may have reasonable coverage in a big town/cities but not on small roads and villages but the operator would have still met their coverage obligation. However this will be changing, at least in UK, with the announcement by EE that they will do a 95% geographic coverage. Kudos to them!

Picture Source: Point-Topic

This map I came across recently shows the rural challenges in Europe for providing connectivity. Whilst not that detailed, I can definitely say from a UK point of view, there are many places outside big towns and cities that have coverage gaps.

Picture Source: GSMA: Digital inclusion in Latin America and the Caribbean - Feb 2016

Picture Source: GSMA: Consumer barriers to mobile internet adoption in Africa - July 2016

As can be seen above, a similar problem is present in Africa and Carribean and Latin America (CALA). In these regions, in addition to the coverage gap, affordability and lack of relevant content are also major issues.

To put it simply in most countries, there is that last 10% of the population for whom coverage is not deemed feasible for the operator.  The problem is that the investment would generally outweigh the revenues. The installation (site, backhaul, etc.) and the maintenance cost would almost always outweigh the profits.

This is one of the challenges that Parallel Wireless* is trying to solve.

What if you can make the deployment very simple and reduce the installation cost and have minimal maintenance cost?

The operator would be far more willing to give it a try. There was an announcement between Parallel Wireless and Telefonica I+D for exactly this reason recently. The small communities wherein these small cells are deployed also have a vital role to play. Not only could they help by making sites available, they can have directly report any issues that would arise. An example of this can be seen in the picture above, demonstrating a small cell deployment in a community center.

An important thing to bear in mind is the support for different types of backhaul for small cells. While cellular/LTE backhaul can allow quick deployment, additional type of backhaul can become available much quicker than anticipated. The small cell deployment should be flexible enough to be able to handle this new change.

A real life example of the above statement can be seen in the picture from a recent site survey.

Finally, I would like to embed this video that explains the Parallel Wireless Rural Solution very well.


Please feel free to add your suggestions in the comments below.

*Full Disclosure: I work for Parallel Wireless as a Solutions Architect. 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.

Small Cells Deployment Stories

I recently got an opportunity to hear about the small cell deployment studies, organised as SCWS pre-conference workshop. The combined slides from the presentation are embedded below and available to download from Small Cell Forum page here.

HetNets On The Bus

Earlier in March, I helped organise 'The Gigabit Train' seminar'. The intention was to look at the connectivity options inside the trains and its monetisation. While connectivity in the trains is challenging, thinking back about it, due to a predictable route it can be sometimes easy to deploy. It could be more of a challenge for cars and buses that go through unpredictable routes and conditions.

I also discussed the "Vehicular CrowdCell" or "Vehicular Small Cell" concept here to look at some advantages of such a solution option.

Some of you may be aware that I recently joined Parallel Wireless. We were selected by M1 Limited, Singapore’s most vibrant and dynamic communications company, to support its WiFi-On-The-Go service as a part of the HetNet trial.

This is the architecture of the On-Bus Hetnet. Some of you would find it self-explanatory.

The mobile operators in Singapore are looking for innovative technologies to address spectrum scarcity as subscriber demand is growing rapidly with smartphone penetration reaching 130 devices per 100 people. Maximizing utilization of the spectrum and easing network congestion in areas with heavy human traffic is necessary to meet Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (iDA) vision of connecting the whole nation as a part of world’s-first Smart Nation initiative.

Real-time HetNet orchestration and traffic prioritization is made possible by HetNet Gateway (HNG). All bus riders receive seamless, high throughput connectivity from an on-bus multi-mode LTE/Wi-Fi Converged Wireless System (CWS) small cell with integrated backhaul including licensed assisted backhaul.  By enabling carrier aggregation for backhaul, the end user throughput can be increased 10 times (up to 300 Mbps) allowing transit passengers to enjoy multimedia content without buffering.

Here is a presentation that gives the complete story:

Some questions on this demo from Linkedin:

Q: Does seamless handover are available with no drop in data throughput through out the travel route of Bus? 
A: Yes, handover is seamless, no dropped data or voice calls. This was one of the iDA trial requirements. We can do seamless VoLTE to VoWiFi handover and back.

Q: What is the maximum data rates does the system accommodate for all seamless data transfers? Does the system support motion video play from N/W. If so of what bandwidth and data rates? 4. How many users does the system support and what data rates?
A: It will depend on the backhaul. We can increase backhaul capacity with CA on 4G + to 300 Mbps shared bandwidth.

Q: This seems to be a relay device ( a femto or pico grade small cell with UE backhaul). an their innovative hetnet gateway for traffic engineering ( LBS support ). 
A: Our in-vehicle unit is a Small cell (LTE/Wi-Fi for access) with any backhaul incl UE backhaul. The HetNet Gateway, in addition to performing 3G, 4G, WI-Fi gateway functionality and real-time SON with ICIC, will also do the traffic engineering.

And demo from inside the bus:


Further reading:

• Parallel Wireless Selected by M1 to Support Smart Nation Trial

Wireless densification via HetNet orchestration

According to a whitepaper that was published late last year by ThinkSmallCell:

There are commonly thought to be three ways to densify wireless traffic capacity:
1. More spectrum (expensive, limited)
2. More spectrally efficiency (e.g. LTE rather than 2G)
3. More spatial reuse (i.e. small cells)
But there is also a fourth aspect which can deliver significant additional benefit
4. Orchestration and tighter control. (e.g. SON (Self Organising Networks), traffic steering/shaping across and between all available wireless resources)

This has been a key factor driving replacement of outdated macrocells with “Single RAN” basestation equipment that supports all generations of radio interface. These specifically address (1) and (2) above. What’s needed next is investment in tools and equipment that provides similar flexibility for (3) and (4), scaling to cope with an influx of small cells and introducing real-time management and co-ordination across all available wireless technologies, both cellular and Wi-Fi.

While we dont generally hear a lot about SON nowadays, I know most of the vendors have implemented some or the other aspects of SON in their equipment. Orchestration can definitely have a much bigger impact than SON by itself on the densification.

In 5G, we talk about 'edgeless cells', 'no-edge networks', etc. Orchestration of the network will have a big part to play in this too.

Anyway, here is the whitepaper embedded below and available to download from Slideshare