How the integration of small access and wireless backhaul can revolutionise operator business models

Airspan have developed a single operator small cell solution and are emphatic that this type of technology is the only feasible option in the deployment of small cells. TowerXchange talk to their Vice President of Marketing and Business Development to find out more about their views.

TowerXchange: Could you briefly introduce yourself and your company to our subscribers who may not be familiar?

I am the Vice President of Strategic Marketing and Business Development at Airspan Networks. I am responsible for developing and managing the corporate and commercial positioning of the company and its products, as well as developing new business opportunities and strategic partnerships. Since 2007 I have held numerous roles within the company from accounts receivable manager in sub-Saharan Africa to VP Sales for Africa and Southern Europe. In 2015 I also worked for GO Scale Capital as a TMT associate, managing portfolio companies of the fund looking to expand in South East Asia and mainland China. I hold a Bsc in International Economics from Bocconi University in Milan and an MBA from IE Business School Madrid.

Airspan is a leading LTE RAN solution provider, with over 1000 customers in over 100 countries. Airspan is regularly recognised as a leader and pioneer in LTE access and innovative backhaul solutions. Airspan has an expansive product portfolio, which includes indoor and outdoor small cells, and all-outdoor, compact micro and macro base stations all based on Qualcomm chipsets, a variety of user devices and network optimisation products. These connectivity solutions operate in bands from 400 MHz up to 6.4 GHz and 60-80 GHz millimetre wave.

Airspan employs 500+ people around the world and have R&D in the UK, Middle East and India, and provide access and backhaul for small cell solutions at rooftop and street level (with a host of compact all in one base stations that range from 1-20W). Airspan is a leader in indoor small cells  (ceiling, wall and desk mounted solutions). Our small cell backhaul solutions use a mix of LTE relay and iBridge technologies, and our USP is that our solutions integrate access and backhaul within the same box.

TowerXchange: You have had a lot of success in attracting MNO clients and running small cell deployments with them, could you tell us about some of your projects to date?

Our most prominent small cells deal to date is our partnership with Jio (Reliance). Airspan is the official small cell partner to Reliance (Jio), our biggest small cell deployment to date, and the single biggest greenfield deployment of small cells globally, since September 2016 Jio has acquired > 100M subs carrying more than 350 TB of data and terminating more than five million VoLTE calls daily all of this over Airspan indoor and outdoor small cells.

Among others we have major engagements with Turkcell and Afrimax Vodafone Group. We will also be announcing more soon. But I think our most compelling point of attraction is the fact that we provide solutions for both access and backhaul that are tightly integrated in the same form factor.

The use cases we address for these MNO’s are:

- “Gap fill” is a big part of our MNO service, but we are also a big part of the macro network because we have a 2x20W small cell containing sophisticated antenna technology which allows us to be a compelling replacement for a macro station.

- One area of our expertise is addressing rural coverage projects (an area which is often overlooked in favour of dense, urban environments) and the ability to provide a cost-effective solution allowing the right amount of coverage and capacity at the right cost to validate the business case.

- Because 80% of data is consumed indoors, the real challenge is meeting the capacity and coverage problems and therefore operators are turning their attention to indoor enterprises such as stadia and shopping malls. We have also been very active at Nascar events, and deployed tens of thousands of small cells in India (in-building).

TowerXchange: So you are addressing both the indoor and the outdoor small cell requirements for the MNOs?

Historically most of our business has been in outdoor deployments, but in the last five years, and especially because of our relationship with Reliance, we’ve been increasing our activity in indoor deployments. We believe very strongly in the juxtaposition and complementary nature of our indoor and outdoor products, and our indoor product portfolio also includes carrier Wi-Fi solutions.

A key function of our outdoor solution is that we have an omnidirectional Switch Beam Antenna (SBA) which allows us to remotely determine the direction of the signal, this gives us a 40-50% increase in performance over traditional omni’s. We produce 1W, 5W, 10W and 20W outdoor solutions, this allows us to cater for the different requirements our customers might have, depending on the space in which they need to connect. The acquisition and economics of different sites are not standardised or harmonised, and unless operators have very specific knowledge, or are in a very specific country it becomes very difficult to roll out small cells with a blanket approach.

We believe macro cell solutions are still needed as a first coverage solution, but that maximising network roll out depends on the utilisation of spectrum assets, to achieve best effect you need to have a very strong small cell layer both outdoor and indoor. By integrating access and backhaul for both indoor and outdoor deployment topologies we give operators the fastest possible means to increase their spectral efficiency.

TowerXchange: Could you please run through why you favour small cells over DAS?

The argument for small cells vs DAS is a non-starter. DAS doesn’t even come close to small cells because you’re only increasing coverage with DAS, rather than increasing capacity. DAS is also hugely expensive. Airspan’s indoor enterprise small cell is less than $1000, so we can offer a 100x performance cost advantage over an equivalent DAS system. Instead of extending the coverage with expensive infrastructure we improve capacity by effectively moving the cell centre to the UE’s at the poor performing cell edge thus avoiding draining a lot of resources from the macro cell. This dramatically improves the user experience as it appears they are directly under the macro cell.

TowerXchange: Are Airspan developing a multi-operator solution?

Our products are frequency specific. Any additional operators would need to add their own units, unless these operators had the same frequency licenses. You really want to add the same baseband and radio in the same product, otherwise you start splitting architecture and drive OPEX expenses up through rental costs.

We provide all in one baseband and radio which is tailored to meet the needs of specific operators. By doing so we are able to miniaturise our products, furthermore by integrating backhaul to our access solutions our products become very client specific except for the cases where we use 5 GHz and MM Wave.

TowerXchange: What is your relationship like with the Towercos? Have you had any interest from them wanting to offer small cells as-a-service or be a neutral host?

We haven’t done any significant work with the towercos to date because Airspan are positioned as the equipment provider. Towercos are typically drawn into small cells through their dialogue with the operator, but now the idea of offering small cells as-a-service is gathering pace, we could feasibly start working with them.

The problem is that small cells as-a-service on paper, for a PE firm sounds compelling, but there are significant caveats to the business model because it depends on whether the operator has the same frequency as the small cell that is deployed on the tower. It all comes back to the key asset in all of these discussions, which is spectrum – what is the spectrum? How much do you have? How much do you need? Based on that you can go back and choose what to deploy. The operators who are spectrum constrained will look at small cells first. The operators with spectrum to spare are going to be able to deliver a higher end user experience. As long as they have a first umbrella coverage through the macro network and they can then invest in a small cell network. This will allow them to pinpoint their capex and validate the business case.

TowerXchange: Do you think that we will see a neutral host environment, and who do you think is best placed to take that role?

As we move forwards, there is a potential requirement for it. I’d reference the TowerXchange interview with Ooredoo / Telenor Myanmar which outlined how neither company could arrive at a site sharing agreement because Telenor didn’t want to pay for Ooredoo’s capex for their power infrastructure. For example, from a competitive point of view, within a neutral host context, it’s very difficult to imagine one operator paying another for their site build costs, unless there’s an urban area and they really need the site.

Airspan has the widest portfolio of outdoor and indoor small cells and small cell backhaul in the industry which are aimed at helping operators increase their spectral efficiency so they can offer the highest capacity possible. Our mission is to disrupt and revolutionise the way network capex and opex models work today.