Small rural licensees are racing to beat the clock when it comes to FCC-mandated network build-out requirements, and one of those, Space Data, has turned to a software-based platform from Lemko that virtualizes core network functions.
Lemko is pitching its LTEe7000p platform as a "license save" product that helps rural and remote operators "protect spectrum investments and meet license compliance requirements, while remaining profitable."
The company said its LTE platform provides rural service providers with a distributed mobile wireless network that enables quick deployments to meet build-out deadlines and delivers low total cost of ownership. Lemko's distributed mobile architecture hollows out the network core and moves all of the switching, routing and gateway equipment to the network's edge to provide lower up-front capex and lower ongoing opex.
According to a Telecompetitor article, Space Data--which is best known for using weather balloons to deploy small radio transceivers--will deploy Lemko's technology in a network using a single cell site in a remote Alaskan village. The network will employ satellite communications for backhaul.
Brian Ponte, vice president of business development for Lemko, told Telecompetitor that depending upon tower height, a single site with Lemko's equipment should be able to cover a radius of about five miles when AWS spectrum is employed and about twice that distance with 700 MHz spectrum.
There are a number of other initiatives being launched to help rural license holders meet various FCC build-out deadlines. For example, NetAmerica Alliance has an affiliate membership program it is pitching as a "license-saver program," which can help carriers that won licenses in the lower 700 MHz band via Auction 73 meet the FCC mandate to provide wireless service coverage in 35 percent of each licensed geographic area by June 2013.
For more:
- see this Lemko release
- see this Telecompetitor article
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