AT&T Wireless Services Inc. affiliate Triton PCS Inc. selected Transcept Inc. to help the carrier extend its personal communications services network using Transcept’s TransCell 1900TM PCS-Over-Microwave system.
Trancept’s focus is on offering equipment that helps carriers deploy and improve their networks while building fewer towers by using surplus bandwidth on cable, fiber and microwave networks.
Transcept’s TransCell 1900TM is a Time Division Multiple Access microwave-based system that uses a single base transceiver station to control multiple antenna sites. Sites are connected via repeater links that make use of unlicensed frequencies, said Steven Johnson, president of Transcept. Traffic can flow back and forth between base stations and repeaters as well as between repeaters.
Transcept said by reducing the number of BTS sites, Triton PCS could eliminate up to two-thirds of the deployment costs associated with highway cell sites and considerably reduce deployment time.
The system also reduces operational costs by more than 50 percent by reducing the need for T1 interconnects, said Transcept.
“Transcept’s PCS-Over-Microwave system enables us to more cost-effectively cover highway corridors to provide our customers with seamless service,” said Clyde Smith, Triton PCS executive vice president and chief technology officer.
Triton, which operates its network under the SunCom brand name, plans to purchase $22 million of equipment and services during a three-year period. Transcept already has deployed some network equipment covering a 60-mile stretch of highway in South Carolina and plans to provide additional equipment next year.
Transcept said the agreement is its first commercial deployment for its PCS-Over-Microwave system.
Transcept was created when Lockheed Martin Corp. sold its Sanders Telecommunications System subsidiary to Spencer Trask & Co. in June.
Its primary products include a PCS-Over-Cable system that has been deployed by Wireless North, as well PCS-Over-Fiber and PCS-Over-Microwave products.
Trancept’s Johnson commented that in addition to covering highway corridors, the PCS-Over-Microwave system would be ideally suited for rural and sparsely populated areas.
