Parallel Wireless already deployed O-RAN sites in Nigeria, Tanzania, Guinea Conakry, Ghana, South Sudan, Uganda, DRC and Malawi
U.S.-based Open RAN (O-RAN) firm Parallel Wireless said it has already deployed a total of 1,500 sites across Africa.
Parallel Wireless partnered with regional telecommunications providers and governments in countries including Nigeria, Tanzania, Guinea Conakry, Ghana, South Sudan, Uganda, DRC, and Malawi to deploy hybrid networks tailored to the needs of specific regions across the African continent.
The company noted its solutions include 2G and 3G for rural areas, and 2G and 4G for urban and suburban areas.
“Our extensive and complex deployments were successful due to our familiarity and experience with the region, which helped us navigate the complex environmental challenges and lack of resources in these areas,” said Yisrael Nov, VP of global sales at Parallel Wireless. “By extending modern networks throughout these territories, and leveraging multiple technologies, a large population will experience a stronger network, bringing them into a new era of reliable connectivity.”
The company also noted it is currently preparing networks for future 5G upgrades across Africa.
Steve Papa, founder and CEO of Parallel Wireless, said: “Reliable communication goes beyond convenience for the residents of these nations. These 1,500 sites provide opportunities for residents to not just connect with families but to leverage new technologies that will improve their day to day lives.”
In a separate release, Parallel Wireless said it has partnered with Hotspot Network , a network-as-a-service (NaaS) provider, to extend coverage to previously unconnected rural sites throughout Nigeria.
This collaboration aims to connect residents of rural regions to essential services such as health, education, and financial services. Hotspot Network offers its services to leading mobile networks in Nigeria, providing a portfolio of products and services through collaboration with a network of global partners, Parallel Wireless said.
Hotspot Networks is working directly with local and national governments to build 2G and 4G wireless communications infrastructure beyond the radio network.
Once Hotspot Networks’ hardware is installed, Parallel Wireless noted it can manage network activity via their Open RAN software.
Last month, Parallel Wireless announced the general availability of what it claims to be the world’s first hardware-agnostic 5G Standalone (SA) software stack.
The company noted that the full Standalone solution gives operators, private networks and public safety networks the opportunity to deploy the Parallel Wireless RAN infrastructure across various processor hardware platforms.
The firm highlighted that its 5G SA solution is purposefully architected to run on any general-purpose computing platform, including Arm and x86. Future enhancements to the 5G solution are automatically compatible with these platforms, the company said.
Parallel Wireless said it had created the first hardware-agnostic distributed unit (DU), which offers flexibility to operators by decoupling the DU software stack from specific computing platforms.
