Beside hearing the obligatory merger rumors, and seeing an unbelievably massive amount of cell phone bling on display, last week’s CTIA showcased plenty of equipment vendors showing off technologies that can help operators serve up blazing fast mobile broadband connections. Clearly small cells are a huge part of the answer. As the pace of LTE deployment accelerates, more small cell deployments will happen. However, we are just at the foot of what will almost certainly be a steep learning curve on how to most effectively deploy small cells.
At this year’s show, RCR Wireless talked to some of the leading technologists – and an analyst or two – in North America about the challenges that need to be overcome in the next 12 months to get the ball rolling with respect to small cell deployments.
Our panel’s comments indicated that, despite the hype, fundamental challenges remain. In a nutshell, these challenges include:
- Interference coordination with the underlaid macro network
- Spectrum scarcity
- Diverse backhaul options
Here’s my video essay on the answers that I found in the Big Easy.
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