Wireless carriers have created heterogeneous networks to solve coverage and capacity problems in specific high-profile locations, but these solutions will be needed more broadly as demand for mobile data skyrockets. Operators need solutions that can scale efficiently in order to build networks that yield a positive return on investment.
“The industry needs a good bridge. We need a bridge from the architectures that we have today to something that really gets us to simplicity, scalability and flexibility,” said Philip Sorrells, vice president of strategic marketing at CommScope.
Sorrells outlined four requirements of wireless infrastructure solutions that can facilitate scalable solutions. He said that architectures should be frequency agnostic, should be intuitive and software-driven, should allocate capacity dynamically, and should be built on standard infrastructure. Sorrells joined RCR Wireless and AT&T recently to discuss investing in hetnets, along with representatives from Real Wireless, Ixia and Accedian Networks.
AT&T’s Paula Doublin, assistant vice president for construction and engineering, said the industry needs to collaborate on solutions and adopt common infrastructure.
“One of the things that’s probably the bigger challenge of all solutions out there is to build a community, and adopt the infrastructure or the hardware that is necessary for the solution,” she said. Doublin added that the carriers and equipment makers are both guilty of expecting rapid deployments of solutions that have not had time to build an ecosystem.
“A solution is developed, it’s ahead of its testing model, it is put out into the marketplace, people get all excited about it and then they’re expecting deployments to happen almost immediately,” she said. “We all know that that’s not the case.”
Sorrells said that one way to build community around a solution is to leverage existing equipment and expertise.
“As we build out this capacity it needs to be building blocks that are modular and common to what people in that normal ecosystem are used to working with,” he said. “So for example in an enterprise building you would want the cabling system to look like standard IT cabling.”
Deployment scenarios
Carriers often deploy distributed antenna systems in order to prepare venues for major events, and they may architect the system with that event’s expected traffic patterns in mind. Sorrells said successful hetnets need to adapt to traffic changes.
“[In] many of the hot spots or enterprise buildings or venues that we’re serving, the number of users and the type of capacity demands that they have are very dynamic,” he said. “They’ll change from one type of event to another type of event by dramatic amounts. So the capacity scaling needs to be able to be done dynamically.”
Other deployments are not targeting event venues, but instead are aimed at fixing network trouble spots. As operators explore small cells to address these issues, the testing process is critical.
“At the end of the day the performance from that small cell or that pico, or whatever that may be, needs to have a high enough quality level that it really impacts the overall performance of the network without creating interference,” said Sorrells.
For more on investing in hetnets and optimizing performance, watch the RCR Wireless webinar or download the complimentary feature report: Investing in Heterogeneous Networks.
