Europe France : Alcatel-Lucent announced the expansion of its Wideband-CDMA/High Speed Packet Access (W-CDMA/HSPA) portfolio with a new distributed base station product, the fanless 60-watt remote radio head (RRH) node B, the first platform of its kind in the industry.
This innovative, high-power product will help mobile operators achieve cost savings and will provide greater flexibility for 3G networks deployments Alcatel-Lucent recently completed successful HSPA data calls on the platform.
This new base station enables a 50 percent increase in available output power over the previous generation of equipment and offers similar improvements as compared to competitors' products currently on the market. This platform was developed to address customer requirements driven by the increase in data traffic coming from the growing availability of flat rate data plans as well as the increasing adoption of multimedia terminals on 3G networks. Alcatel-Lucent is introducing the technology to extend the range of deployment options for RRH-based solutions and provide its customers with higher power products as they need them.
"The core value of remote radio heads - improved RF performance and simplified siting - has been understood for years," notes Peter Jarich, Research Director with Current Analysis. "More important, however, is the availability of high-power offers, which can support operator demands ranging from broad coverage to support for carrier scalability either for a single operator or across operators interested in a RAN-sharing approach that can distribute the cost of a network over different owners".
Remote radio heads are part of a distributed base station (known as a "Node B" in W-CDMA networks) in which all radio-related functions are contained in a small single unit that can be deployed in a location remote from the main unit.
This provides exceptional flexibility for operators that face deployment constraints based on site acquisition challenges or physical limitations with different sites.By successfully integrating this innovative 60-watt remote radio head, Alcatel-Lucent confirms its leadership in W-CDMA distributed Node B solutions.
"The distributed Node B concept significantly improves service availability while at the same time optimizing our customers' capital and operating expenditures," said Patrick Plas, President of Alcatel-Lucent's W-CDMA activities. "Most mobile operators are now looking at extending the use of remote radio head-based solutions into additional types of locations and applications, and are looking at higher output power in particular. The capability offered by this new RRH adds to the value of our portfolio and proves once again Alcatel-Lucent's focus on having its customer benefit from the very latest technological developments ahead of the rest of the market."
Alcatel-Lucent's RRH portfolio complies with strictest environmental standards. As all the products are fanless, they are silent, and combined with their best-in-class power efficiency, bring a significant reduction in terms of energy consumption, in spite of their high power output. This portfolio also reinforces Alcatel-Lucent's customers' investment protection with a hardware platform that is ready to support future 3GPP standard upgrades.