Cutting the Cost of Transmission in Emerging Markets

Details: Category: Wireless Networks; 24 June 2008; 9120 views

Despite significant advances to drive down capital costs for Mobile Network Operators, several key challenges still remain before the digital divide is able to be fully bridged. Transmission costs stand out as the No.1 barrier...

Despite significant advances to drive down capital costs for Mobile Network Operators (MNOs), several key challenges still remain before the digital divide is able to be fully bridged. Transmission costs stand out as the No.1 barrier according to Irish company Altobridge who provide gateway and local connectivity platforms designed to cut backhaul costs to and from base station sites as well as providing local call switching at the base station site.

Although more subscribers in more areas can now be connected and are reaping the benefits that mobile communications brings, high transmission costs continue to hinder the delivery of communications to a huge number of people around the world. The more the mobile industry can reduce transmission costs, the more subscribers will be connected, and the more remote communities and people will be brought into the connected world.

Transmission capacity is becoming a rare and expensive commodity and as new generations of technology are introduced, ever more capacity is being demanded. Altobridge is currently working with MNOs on ways to deliver solutions to this challenge. One key partnership is with Maxis, covering parts of East Malaysia with its ‘Remote Community' service.

The company has invested significant resources over the past five years resulting in several major technology breakthroughs which it believes have had a measurable impact on mobile operators' bottom lines. Two of these breakthroughs, the company's Local Connectivity solution and its Split Communications Architecture, are, it believes, now poised to have major impact on networks, globally.

"We have developed what we term our Local Connectivity solution," said Mike Fitzgerald, Altobridge CEO, "through which it is possible to keep local traffic local, therefore removing the cost of traffic being backhauled, back and forth across the network. We achieve this without impacting the standard signalling protocols of the core network and, with up to 70% of traffic being local in emerging markets, this breakthrough is hugely important."

The second breakthrough is a new patented 'Split Communications Architecture'. This takes the core network element that controls base stations and splits it, creating an 'on-demand' solution. This enables the operator to take control of the transmission link and drive down costs by utilising the link more efficiently. The system reduces voice calls down to between 5 and 8 Kbits/s per call, the most operationally efficient solution at market today.

"When we combine these two breakthroughs together with a cost-effective remote base station, MNOs can benefit from the most operationally efficient communications solution for remote communities currently available, particularly for smaller locations of between 100 and 300 subscribers", says Fitzgerald.

Altobridge's intellectual property has evolved from working in some important vertical markets. It has already launched the world's first cost-effective mobile phone system for commercial aircraft, available today from AeroMobile and flying with Emirates amongst others. Its solution to provide standard, cost-effective mobile communications to the world's merchant maritime industry is also available today from Blue Ocean Wireless. Altobridge licenses its software to leading vendors and operators including Ericsson.

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