SANTA CLARA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Tarana Wireless™, the leading industry innovator in universal wireless transport, shared today results from outdoor wireless tests conducted in conjunction with a service provider in skyscraper-saturated lower Manhattan. The tests yielded unmatched results and presented breakthrough evidence of the unique abilities of Tarana’s AbsoluteAir™ universal wireless transport platform. Multiple tests were conducted in locations where signal propagation was entirely blocked by scores of skyscrapers. The results irrefutably demonstrate that “true NLoS” wireless communications at high capacity is consistently achievable with Tarana’s AbsoluteAir™ products — a feat unmatched by any other product.
Additional tests focused on measuring the performance of multiple concurrent links operating in a single channel to simulate an urban area with small cells deployed close together. With Tarana’s Universal Frequency Reuse, the links performed at full rate while sustaining link quality and range. No other wireless backhaul technology has demonstrated this level of sustained high capacity under similar circumstances.
“Tarana has created a new paradigm with its AbsoluteAir solution,” said Berge Ayvazian, senior consultant, Heavy Reading. “I was truly impressed by the field demonstration I saw where wireless backhaul links were blocked by multiple buildings located about 1 kilometer (km) apart. In addition, the antennas at both ends of the links were not even pointed in the same direction and yet attained their full 75 Mbps capacity. This is truly an industry first that will enable carriers to deploy wireless backhaul for outdoor small cells just about anywhere.”
Tarana Field Test Results
The extensive Manhattan trial results, conducted at street level with production-ready Tarana products, has shattered common beliefs about the abilities of NLoS products while clearly distinguishing AbsoluteAir as the first universal wireless transport solution. Highlights from Tarana’s tests emphasize the dramatic abilities delivered by its product:
- Deterministic Performance: A true NLoS link was closed at every site location attempted. 100% of links within 1 km and 75% of links between 1 km and 3 km attained the full 75 Mbps link capacity (10 MHz). These are unprecedented operating distances — up to 10X that of other products. Tarana’s true NLoS requires dramatically fewer nodes enabling significantly reduced capital build out costs and the ability to install small cells just about anywhere.
- Unprecedented Spectral Efficiency: With Tarana’s Concentrating Multipoint (CMP) topology, multiple simultaneous channel links were tested in a single 10 Mhz channel and achieved full rate and without degradation in signal quality or range. No other known backhaul technology has demonstrated this level of capacity simultaneously across multiple links without impact to range or throughput. Tarana’s Universal Frequency Reuse feature enables service providers to scale capacity to very dense metro-scale deployments without compromise while achieving the most efficient utilization of spectrum.
- Lowest Cost Installation: With only coarse alignment at one end, all links were established, fully optimized and carrying traffic within 5 minutes of arrival at each test site. Such “instant” zero-touch installations essentially eliminate costly deployment planning and time consuming manual fine-tuning of antennas required by other products.
Lower Manhattan represents one of the most challenging environments in the world for wireless communications. For the tests, one end of the wireless connection was an AbsoluteAir node statically mounted on top of a +40 story building; this node served as the link concentrator node. Additional AbsoluteAir nodes were mounted on 2 meter poles located on mobile vehicles. Vehicles were driven to more than 30 randomly selected locations at distances ranging from 100 meters to 3.0 km from the concentrator node. In all instances, the wireless links tested were blocked completely by multiple, and in many cases dozens, of buildings. At each location, the vehicle was stopped, the antenna coarsely aligned, and the links automatically established enabling comprehensive link quality measurements.
For the spectral efficiency test, the concentrator node connected to two different EN nodes operating in the same 10 MHz channel and located less than 1 km away. Both links performed at full capacity and link quality.
No other vendor has published similar test results that come close to delivering the requirements of a universal wireless transport solution. Tarana’s AbsoluteAir with its CMP topology breaks the barrier that, up until now, has made other backhaul technologies cost-prohibitive and impractical for deployment in dense urban environments.
“I am excited to share these phenomenal results achieved in Manhattan that prove Tarana delivers unmatched deterministic performance and spectral efficiency even in the toughest of environments for wireless communications,” stated Steve Sifferman, president and CEO of Tarana Wireless. “We have completed multiple tier one carrier trials this year on three continents where our AbsoluteAir products achieved similar results and demonstrated best in class performance.”
Small Cells Require True NLoS Backhaul
“We are forecasting that up to 50% of small cells will be backhauled by NLoS solutions,” said Nick Marshall, principal analyst at ABI Research. “We expect that only a small percentage of small cells will have clear line of sight; the remainder will be partially or fully obstructed which points to the critical need for a true NLoS wireless transport that can operate at full capacity even in the densest of urban areas. Tarana's field tests demonstrate that its solution can meet and exceed this service provider requirement.”
Ayvazian of Heavy Reading recently observed that carriers will require a “universal wireless transport” solution for the cost-effective backhaul of dense metro-scale outdoor small cell capacity and coverage deployments in urban areas.
An excerpt of Tarana’s tests conducted in Manhattan will be made available on the company’s website.
About Tarana Wireless
Tarana Wireless has pioneered the development of a carrier Ethernet-based universal wireless transport solution that is unmatched in delivering deterministic performance at full capacity providing “true NLoS” connectivity. AbsoluteAir was designed as a metro-scale and is a breakthrough innovation that provides ubiquitous coverage, unprecedented capacity and scalability, simplified deployment, zero-touch operation, and the lowest total cost of ownership of any NLoS product.
For more information about Tarana Wireless, please visit our website and follow us on Twitter.
