Small cell, big opportunity
February saw CBNL pack its bags for sunny rainy Barcelona for the annual telcofest, Mobile World Congress.
That certain buzz the event had been missing for the last couple of years had returned.
Each hall was brimming with eager executives ready to demonstrate their latest wares.
Although the rain fell on Wednesday and Thursday, not even the weather could put a dampener on the excitement come the end of the week.
Whilst many an eye fixated on a certain Russian company’s dancing girls, operators and equipment vendors were singing the praises of a diminutive product, the small cell.
Discussion centred on the need for the network topology to be reorganised – something CBNL has been discussing for a number of years – and specifically looking at the introduction of a local layer, at street level, to provide better coverage and capacity to subscribers.
Femtos, Picos, Macros. There was lots of confusion about which solution will win out, whether a hybrid approach was best, and what the performance of these small cells actually was.
But one thing is certain, change is afoot and it’s going to need backhaul.
Linked to the small cell discussion, point-to-multipoint (PMP) was another phrase reverberating around the Fira.
There was much talk about PMP No Line of Site (NLOS) backhaul for small cells.
This recognised PMP as a core technology standard for mobile backhaul, but to date few vendors have adopted true PMP architecture.
What we do know is that as the PMP market leader, CBNL is in the perfect position and ready to take on the small cell challenge.