Members of the Competitive Carriers Association (CCA) will gain access to one-of-a-kind LTE data roaming hub developed by Transaction Network Services (TNS).
TNS said the Data Services Hub is the only roaming hub of its kind in the industry, providing participating operators with the opportunity to connect LTE roaming, Wi-Fi access and interoperability with requisite 3G roaming fallback.
The hub was created in response to a formal request for proposal (RFP) issued by CAA, which sought out organizations interested in hosting the service. The steering committee of CCA's Business Innovation Group ultimately selected TNS to provide the hub.
The hub should help competitive carriers work more easily together to expand their national footprints and will also provide a single point of interconnection for international operators looking to negotiate and implement roaming agreements with CCA members for LTE and other data services.
"For competitive carriers to continue to compete and survive in the marketplace, they must have real roaming solutions, and I am pleased that TNS will provide a platform to achieve this important goal," said Steven Berry, CCA president and CEO.
Surendra Saboo, CEO of TNS' telecom services division, said enabling LTE roaming and next-generation data services is crucial to helping operators realize high margin roaming revenues, grow ARPU and prevent the churn of high-value subscribers.
In September 2012, the Rural Cellular Association rebranded as the Competitive Carriers Association to better reflect its membership and role in the industry as it began adding larger carriers to its roster. Members now include Clearwire (NASDAQ:CLWR), T-Mobile USA and Sprint Nextel (NYSE:S).
For more:
- see this TNS press release
Related articles:
CTIA, CCA forge partnership for 2014 shows
Court deals blow to Verizon, upholds FCC's data roaming rules
Boingo's CEO explains how CCA's Wi-Fi offloading is different from what AT&T, Verizon offer
Boingo wholesales Wi-Fi offloading to CCA wireless carriers
RCA becomes the Competitive Carriers Association