Vodafone Netherlands opted for a small-cell system from SpiderCloud in a bid to offer better in-building voice and data coverage for its enterprise customers. The value of the deal was not disclosed.
The move represents a major coup for U.S.-based SpiderCloud, which first unveiled its plan to help mobile operators better target small and large enterprise customers in 2009. Although nothing has been confirmed, further deals could also be imminent from the Vodafone Group, which started testing SpiderCloud's Enterprise Radio Access Network (E-RAN) small cell system in the UK in February 2012.
"The system is now live in a number of UK-headquartered enterprises, and the announcement with Vodafone Netherlands comes 18 months after successful commercial pilots at selected Vodafone sites," a spokesperson for SpiderCloud told FierceWireless:Europe.
In detail, the E-RAN system consists of a services node (SCSN) that can control over 100 multi-access small cells powered by the enterprise-Ethernet Local Area Network (LAN). SpiderCloud said the system is able to support thousands of employees and can be installed "in just days" using SpiderCloud's Self Organising Network (SON) software.
"We can now, more rapidly than ever, address the needs of thousands of enterprise customers who rely on mobile connectivity and services for business productivity," Marcel van den Biggelaar, the head of technology strategy at Vodafone Netherlands, said in a statement. "Previously we were restricted by the cost and time it took to install legacy in-building wireless systems or the lack of scalability of first-generation small cells."
SpiderCloud's heritage in mobile data services goes back a number of years. The company was established by former executives of Flarion, the company behind early mobile broadband technology Flash-OFDM that was eventually snapped up by Qualcomm in 2005. When it was established, SpiderCloud said it would first target 3G mobile operators in Europe.
Indoor coverage has already been shown to be a key concern for enterprises: According to a YouGov survey commissioned by SpiderCloud in May, many businesses suffering from poor in-building mobile coverage and capacity said they would be willing to move to a new mobile operator that can solve this problem.
For more:
- see this SpiderCloud release
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