Nextlink, a subsidiary of XO Holdings Inc., offers fixed wireless broadband service to carriers, businesses and government agencies for backhaul and Internet access. Yet, the company is different in the fact it offers service in the Local Multipoint Distribution Service (LMDS) band in frequencies between 28 GHz and 31 GHz.
The company recently got a boost from the Federal Communications Commission, which accepted the company’s demonstrations of substantial service in 30 of its LMDS licensed market and granted extensions on the amount of time it has to prove service viability in its remaining 48 markets.
Demonstrating multipoint coverage
The company’s licenses are good for the next decade, but they require the spectrum holder to demonstrate multipoint network coverage of at least 20% in each market with four point-to-point links in the network and the ability to transmit directly from one location to another.
The technology is said to be used extensively in Europe for backhaul, and without the extension, the company’s licenses would have begun expiring this year.
“It’s the first meaningful substantial service showing in this LMDS band in 10 years,” said Tim Dunne, VP of business operations at Nextlink.
Online lease
Last week the company announced a new online marketplace for licensed broadband wireless spectrum, which will allow businesses, government agencies and service providers to lease spectrum in the 28-31 GHz range.
LMDSXchange, which grew out of a coalition of members, makes almost 1 gigahertz of spectrum capacity covering more than 75% of the population available to third parties. The footprint covers more than 80 major metropolitan markets in 40 states.
“We could potentially lease links to build out entire networks,” Dunne said. “We’ll provide installation, we’ll provide maintenance management of that link and we’ll repair it as
needed.”
The new business model is part of the company’s strategy to validate and expand the use of LMDS to a variety of applications.
The group says LMDS spectrum can support data transmission at speeds ranging from 1.5 megabits per second up to 800 Mbps.
