The rise of radio technology
Where, how and why we’ve invested so much in our Hypercities.
In the first blog in this pairing, we discussed the issue of overbuilding - and why the bad press it’s received isn’t necessarily fair. While overbuilding creates economic and resiliency benefits for consumers; it does come with an environmental impact. And there are ways to address this. For Elevate, that means leaning into radio wireless connectivity.
Let’s start with a quick definition.
Rooftop wireless uses secure, encrypted high-frequency radio waves to provide point-to-point internet connectivity, often over long distances, without the need for physical cables. It requires line-of-sight between two antennas; a base station (you can watch our video with Fibrenews for more on that) and another on the rooftop of the customer’s building, which is connected to an indoor router or modem.
The base station building has an Ethernet 10Gb connection installed, which is cabled to the rooftop. This is terminated into the base station antenna, which beams the connection to the customer.
Using wireless radio as an access option allows us to offer the same SLA as fibre: 99.99% uptime, backed by a 4-hour fix. However, installation can be completed much more quickly; in as little as ten days. It can also be paired with fibre as a diverse backup, offering an 100% uptime SLA guarantee.
Benefits to partners
Benefits to partners come in the form of service features that can be passed directly to customers. As well as faster lead times, it offers ultra-high speeds, low latency, accelerated data delivery and robust backup solutions.
Ultimately, it can help you diversify your portfolio with an access option that’s incredibly complementary to more ‘traditional’ connectivity options. In cases where you need to get a customer installed quickly, but they ultimately need a fibre connection, wireless provides a good stop gap to get them online, and then provide a backup for resiliency for the life of the product. We also offer wireless connectivity with short term contracts - as little as 30 days - so it provides an ideal solution for events, temporary installations and other pop-ups.
Where next?
At the moment, we offer 10Gb connections through our wireless rooftop, but someday soon we hope to be able to deliver larger amounts of bandwidth, possibly up to 100Gb.
For us, the most immediate next roll out is in Cardiff, our latest Hypercity. We already have wireless presence established across Manchester, London, Leeds, Liverpool and Birmingham.
It’s a lesser known technology as it stands, but we believe that wireless radio has great potential to be more widely used across a number of use cases that will benefit our business, our partners, their customers and the wider communities in which they operate.
Benefits beyond business
Here’s where we see it going…
Urban (and into suburban) expansion: wireless technology can support urban growth and infrastructure demands as they increase. By allowing communication over longer and longer distances, wireless is well-suited for providing internet to remote locations. It could provide a lower cost, more sustainable alternative to full fibre in suburban and even more remote areas. It’s a very practical solution for bridging infrastructure gaps without the need to dig up roads.
Supporting digitalisation: as key business districts across Britain grow, many are brought back to the office more frequently, and those that WFH continue to depend on the internet anyway, wireless technologies help cater to increasing demand across all sectors, while offering the scalability, reliability and speed that would be expected from wired infrastructure.
Sustainable development: innovative technologies like this reduce the sustainability burden for the reasons we’ve already mentioned. But also because there is simply less physical resource to be manufactured and recycled or reused at end of life.
To learn more about our wireless access options, visit the DIA or AlwaysOn page, or get in touch.