Millimetre wave point to multipoint backhaul is most cost-effective for small cell backhaul
Bluwan, a provider of carrier-grade multi-gigabit wireless solutions, has revealed analysis that demonstrates the CAPEX and OPEX associated with small cell backhaul deployments, which includes analysis of millimetre wave Point to Multipoint (PMP), wireless Point to Point (PTP) and fibre backhaul solutions, over a five year period.
The analysis considers the CAPEX costs associated with the initial deployment of infrastructure equipment, and on-going OPEX costs associated with site rental and maintenance, installation, spectrum licensing and wholesale fibre rental. It also includes conservative estimates for the cost of transmission equipment as well as realistic considerations for the expenses of fibre “trenching” (the cost associate with the digging of roads and installation of ducts to carry fibre cable).
Overall, calculations demonstrate that fibre is by far the most expensive small cell backhaul option. Over a five year period the total cost of ownership (TCO) of fibre backhaul is three times that of millimetre wave PMP, and one and a half times that of wireless PTP. This is largely attributed to the requirement to trench fibre to each greenfield cell site, and the cost of bandwidth rental from wholesale providers.
Similarly, wireless PTP proves to be almost twice as expensive as millimetre wave PMP over the same five year period. This is attributed to the amount of equipment required for each cell link, soaring total OPEX for third party site rental agreements, and the higher spectrum licensing costs for PTP (operating in the 6 to 38 GHz band) versus millimetre wave PMP (operating in the 42 GHz band).
Most significantly, while CAPEX spend in the first year for both wireless solutions are roughly comparable (fibre CAPEX is more than triple that of wireless solutions), OPEX requirement for wireless PTP is more than two and a half times greater than millimetre wave PMP. While the CAPEX requirement drops over five year period, OPEX costs accumulate, adding significantly to the Total Cost of Ownership.
“This analysis clearly demonstrates that it is more than just the cost of the equipment that needs to be considered for small cell backhaul deployments. With savings of up to 200 per cent, operators need to take the full cost of ownership into consideration, especially in dense urban environments,” says Shayan Sanyal, Chief Commercial Officer at Bluwan. “It is the outstanding, continuing costs – such as spectrum licensing, operating costs and site rental – that make the most difference and it is in helping to reduce these that operators can make the greatest gains. Operators cannot ignore these variables.”
In the analysis calculations are based on OPEX and CAPEX requirements to backhaul 20 cell sites in a 1-km radius, each provisioned with 100 MBps of capacity. To make the calculations, certain fixed and variable costs are assumed, based on typical industry norms and known values. Fixed values include Bluwan radio-antenna equipment costs, equipment installation and commissioning costs, and trenching costs. Variable values include known PTP antenna equipment costs, spectrum licensing costs, site rental costs, and wholesale capacity rental costs in the case of fibre.
Operating in the 42 GHz band, Bluwan’s millimetre wave PMP backhaul is better suited to meet the demand for increased network capacity than traditional backhaul approaches. It provides the 100 Mbps needed for LTE that copper cannot accommodate, avoids the expensive trenching of laying cable, and is much more economical than Point to Point (PTP) wireless backhaul.
A single Bluwan millimetre wave PMP transmission hub can connect 20 cell sites at 100 Mbps, offering 20 times more throughput than existing PMP microwave solutions. As it operates in the 42 GHz bands, spectrum is much more cost effective. It also avoids the increased spectrum congestion and limited channel sizes increasingly faced by PTP wireless backhaul solutions in dense, urban areas using sub-40 GHz spectrum.
In addition, millimetre wave PMP only uses one sectoral antenna to serve a cluster of mobile base stations from a transmission hub, meaning it requires less equipment on a mast. This all correlates to more efficient use of limited cell tower space, lower site rental and lower maintenance costs.
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