Today, just for you, the Unmanned ExpertsCEO tells us why drones are a great tool for tower work. He explains how frustrating it is to wait for the FAAto open up the rules for drones so that the commercial work can happen on a widespread scale. How training really matters, and that you need to be trained the right way. You will appreciate his knowledge on drones for commercial use and the history of the FAA’s inaction over the last 10 years or so.
He also goes in the proper way to handle lessons learned, in other words, writing them down isn’t enough, you need to implement changes. Something that I am guilty of, documentation without action. Action matters. Training does matter, knowing the rules matters. And yes, you can use drones for tower inspections legally, today. He could do it 24 hours after you call him to do the inspection!
Kevenis a great guy, someone who can articulate his points about drones for commercial use very well. I really enjoyed talking to him and I think you will learn a lot from what he tells us. He is candid and honest when he talks about drones and regulations here in the USA.
I would like to thank Keven for taking the time, and getting a new phone, and for his openness and honesty on this call. I also want to thank him because my recorder crapped out 10 minutes into the call and I had to start over. Being the professional that he is, he not only started over, feeling the Déjà vu but he gave an outstanding interview! He is just a fascinating guy!
I met Keventhrough Kathy Brand at Tower Safety and Instructionwho partnered with Unmanned Experts to provide drone training for tower workers. I think that it’s a great idea to have 2 leaders in their respective industries work together to provide certifications for people who see this as the new way to get things done efficiently, safely, and cost effectively. Tower workers will find ways to make this a safe alternative to climbing for simple inspections and for site surveys. Now that this is going to move ahead and the FAA is going to clear the way for commercial use soon, I hope, we can make a new viable tool available for the tower industry.
Unmanned Experts not only will fly missions for you but they are also offering training. They partnered with Tower Safety and Instruction to offer drone training for tower workers who meet the qualifications. At this time, you need to have a manned pilots license and drone training to fly legally. Tower Safety and Instruction understands that some people want to get a head start in drone training, so they developed this partnership to have people properly qualified for drone work at towers and to make sure that the students understand the rules and regulations before doing commercial work. It is very important to be certified in the work before doing any tower work. I am a firm believer that you need to be certified before going on a tower site. Working with drones is no different.
Update on fallen climber– For those of you that Didn’t hear, we lost a climber, 73-year-old Milt Jenson who fell 50 feet on an amateur tower doing volunteer work, I added some new links , the full story is here; https://wade4wireless.com/2016/06/10/man-dies-from-fall-at-mt-lemmon/ to see the updated links.
Now the Kenneth Cleveland story:
AT&T is showing that they care when people get injured, maliciously, while working for them. This week they offered a $60K reward for the suspicious death of Kenneth Cleveland while working in Waco. Per their press release, “AT&T is offering a $60,000 reward for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible for Cleveland’s death. The company urges anyone with information to call Waco Police at 254-750-7589.” The official press release from AT&T can be found here.
Here is what I believe happened, from the stories, (all links are below for those of you who need more information), Kenneth Wayne Cleveland, a 61-year-old AT&T tech, was thought to have been electrocuted at a site, working alone apparently. That’s what police thought originally, but then the autopsy revealed that he died from violent injuries, according to the medical examiner. KPLCTV.com reports that Sgt. Patrick Swanton of the Waco police department said, “we realized there is something for us to question what happened. That’s what lead us to believe at this point that this is a murder case, not an accidental death.”
His body was found burning at the street when someone arrived. They are trying to find out what happened. It is so sad and something that we all need to band together to find out what’s going on. Help bring these people to justice if you know of anything.
OK, while this is nowhere near the $250K they offered for the fiber cuts back in September of 2015, story hereand here, it is still a great way to show they care.
Let’s be aware of what’s going on at the tower sites, this is a wake up call for all of you to be aware of who is around and what is going on at the sites. You need to take care of yourselves out there.
I remember one time when I went to a site there were 20 or so guys partying at a remote site in Summerdale, Pa, and the guys didn’t cause any problems, but I told them I was working on a state police radio, even though I wasn’t
I understand that the close out package is a key KPI for most tower work done today. To close out the site you need to have all of the information documented and presented in the format that the customer, usually a carrier, wants to see it. They want all of the information in a specific format. Not only that, but each carrier has their own way of doing things. There really isn’t a standard between carriers, and it would even vary from region to region.
So let’s look into this, what is a close out package? The complete closeout package includes several things, let’s look at the list.
As built drawings. This includes the floor or ground-plan and the equipment on the tower. The equipment with detail, as it is built with serial numbers and color codes and everything.
The component settings at the time of the installation.
All test results from the installation, including PIM, fiber, RF sweeps, and so on.
The equipment list, the BOM.
Pictures of how it looked and of the serial numbers upon final installation.
Final commissioning and power up data.
GPS data.
Antenna height, azimuth and down tilt data.
All equipment data, serial numbers, rev levels, etc.
All cable information.
What does this mean to the crew doing the close out? They have to have all of the data included in the package. They have to have all of the serial numbers, azimuth, GPS data, color codes, and so on all documented in a document that the carrier can use and is acceptable in their system. Remember, a year from now they will look at it and rely on this data to verify the site information if they troubleshoot or do an inventory or when they upgrade to the next rev lever or expand.
One of the main obstacles from getting paid is that the closeout packages were not clear, but now they are pretty specific. Then the problem was that the pictures have to be perfect, so with today’s technology, that is not as hard to do. Problems like the OEM’s Radio Head serial number is on the side that is tight to the tower, you know what I mean, seem to crop up all the time. Getting the pictures right the first time, another issue. Making sure you didn’t miss equipment on a sector and the attitude that what you have is “good enough” won’t cut it. Normally a requirement of the close out package is to see all the serial numbers and have all of the pictures perfect. Everything must be taken into consideration prior to the visit and done right while at the site the first time.
Because of all of these requirements, most crews could not get it done in one visit. There was always something missed that the crew had to go back and do another climb. When you budget these things you think, one visit, but you only get paid if all the information is right, so what so you do? You take the hit and go back and finish the job because some money is better than no money. You want to get future work and you think you learned your lesson, but don’t get complacent! Wireless is not an easy business for the contractor! It is hard work!
So when my sponsor, Tower Tracker Pro, put together this article, I thought it would help some of you out there that do close out packages. It is a big business in the carrier world. Even though there aren’t any major rollouts at this time, there should be some soon. Also, this may be a requirement in the small cell world just on a smaller scale. Documentation is key.
What they have done is lowered the price of the package and also provided you with detailed instructions on how to use the package, along with how to download a free demo. Go ahead, it’s an app on your smartphone, download it and try it, see if you like it. These instructions are step by step.
So here it is, their press release with all of the step by step pictures in it. They walk you through the close out package demo process step by step. Who knows, maybe you will learn something! So pay attention! It has information about how they setup the package and their new lower pricing. Also, remember to try it if you have a smart phone, you can search for Mobile Epiphany in the app store and download it to your phone! It’s really easy!
Tower Tracker Pro and Touch Mobile COP are a close out package system that includes a mobile app for Android Phones (and tablets if you prefer) and iPhone/iPad devices as well. It also includes a PC app for your office people to get those images quickly reviewed, organized and ready for their client. The Mobile app allows tower hands to collect data and images from the tower in a very simple way. The photos are then automatically named (any way you want!), automatically stamped with date, time (and GPS if you want) and then sent to the cloud where they can be pulled down to the admins desk in preparation to send them to your client. The hours saved in admin work and tower revisits (which can now be eliminated!) are pretty darn significant.
Their pricing is extremely low considering the power and capability of the system in combination with the fact that they include phone call support to your tower hands at no extra cost! No matter how many images your company collects on a single tower and no matter how much data you collect, they charge $1 per photo BUT their maximum price per tower is $50 (as of the writing of this article) no matter how many photos you need from that tower. That is incredibly cheap considering all that they provide and how well their system works. And you can give the app to every single employee you want to give it. They just download it from their device’s app store.
If you want a full explanation, call the company for a complete demo.
They also include a true reporting tool. Client data and images can instantly be run as standard reports (PDF, excel or Word format) if your clients prefer their results in a reporting format. Their reporting tool with built-in standard reports is included. You can even pay them extra, if you want, to develop custom reports just for your company. This capability makes their solution even more unique and useful to our industry.
Images in particular are handled with extreme detail and represent the best close out picture image system by far.
They will be named automatically.
They automatically will go into the proper project folder and site folder so keeping your images organized is simple
They will all have date time and GPs stamped on the face of them.
The systems saves you as lot of time and transmission costs by reducing the image resolution to the size of your choosing and the compression of your choosing. So those massive pictures that come out of your camera will now only be about 100K and they look perfect!
Some providers insist that every picture have metadata (Also called EXIF data) inside the image. Tower Tracker Pro ensures that every image has this data in it.
In addition to placing images into a folder, they also provide an image viewer tool that lets you see all the of a given tower, the comments of that image, the name of the image and all the meta data in simple to use viewer. See the image below. One click of the thumbnail image and you are looking at the full image. It’s very click and very efficient.
When you buy Tower Tracker Profrom Mobile Epiphany, you can use their technology in 2 ways.
The first way to buy this technology is for those who want their tower hands to be guided EXACTLY through a close out package as set forth in your clients Close out package documentation. In this approach, you pay Mobile Epiphany some services dollars upfront to have them build you an exact version of your clients close out package. It guides the tower hand, while they are on the tower, through each and every image they have to take and every piece of data they have to collect. Tower Tracker Pro helps your people in the office eliminate the many lost hours of work required to organize photos and helps eliminate the expensive tower revisits that occur when you don’t have a tool like this. It guides both parties (the Tower Hands and the Office people) to know when the job is done. Its keeps them incredibly organized in real-time.
Below, you can see screen shots of the photo log as it appears to a Tower hand on his iPhone or Android Phone and you can see screen shots of how your office people in charge of managing those images can see them organized.
As an example, if you got a Close Out Package document from a carrier that very specifically laid out the exact 75 images you need to take on each sector of the tower and which ones you needed to take on the ground, Mobile Epiphany will build you that exact list of image requests so that the tower hands can see exactly what images they have taken and which ones they have not. It’s worth the money if you plan to do multiple towers with the same requirements. They tend to charge between $1000 and $2000 for the initial setup of specific close out packages if they don’t already have them built. If they already have them, they don’t charge anything. And think how much you will save by eliminating return visits with a guided process for all your tower hands. Here is a list of the close out packages they already have built.
This greatly decreases the risk of having to return to the tower. And since you can get your images in the office within moments of them being taking, your office people can see what they need to retake or what they have not yet taken. Simple communication between office and tower (a cell phone call, text message or email!) can result in NEARLY ZERO RETURN VISITS!! This is not a theory. One of Ericsson’s best tower hand companies, ATLAS SOLUTION INC, recently proved to Ericsson that they were able to drop their return visit rate from about 70% to less than 5% and were able to close out their packages on the same day they started them using this technology. See the charts below. When they performed their SPOT training with Ericsson, they were the only company in the nation to have no remaining images due at the end of the very day they started it.
The second way to buy this technology is to use their generic system for close out packages. All the photos taken will be auto-named based on the category of photo you select from a pre designed menu. You can even give them a list of choices and they will add it to your version at no additional cost. Below, you can see an image of the view from the Tower Hands iPhone, a view from the Administrators desktop (showing the folder structure and final named images placed on their PC) and a view of the report that the reporting tool generates.
The advantage of buying a generic system is that there is no upfront services cost. You only pay per tower. You don’t have to pay them any upfront services fee to build something specific for your project. You just buy the system and start using it. The disadvantage is that the image slots must be guided by some check list known to the Tower hands. Also, even though the images will be nicely organized and named, the naming convention required by your client may or may not be the naming of the photo you get. We know that sprint, for example, has very specific naming conventions. You may have to update the image names on your own if you have this type of customer and you are not using a close out package system designed specifically for our project.
In summary, I strongly recommend you pay for custom services if you plan to do the exact same close out package multiple times and return visits are common and costly in your company. You can save a ton of money. You can save much more than this technology will cost you. Projects which pay your company many thousands of dollars per tower that you repeatedly make the one time cost of a custom close out package well worth the money. For projects which pay much less (like smaller pay maintenance efforts), it makes a lot of sense to simply use their generic close out package system and save the services dollars for custom builds.
Remember, close out packages are serious business. So make sure you’re ready. If you do reach out to them, don’t forget to tell then Wade sent you. I hope you learned something today, I know that I did!
Today I have Rick Ledford of Comstar,www.Comstarusa.com goes over the training that Comstar offers. He is the COO of Comstar. I would like to thank Rick for taking the time to talk to me, it was a great talk. Now the audio at the end got a little choppy, sorry, but the interview is great. Rick talks about how the training has evolved past just certification into a full-blown course for not only tower workers, but RF and field works. This school Rick has put together goes beyond the 2-day training program into a full-blown course for field work.
It would be best if you listen to Rick, but the course is going to prepare you for more than just the climb. It has all the certifications built is and troubleshooting techniques to take you beyond just being a laborer. You get fiber certification, climbing certification, first aid certification, and more. You learn to sweep fiber and RF lines.
Tower Safety and Instruction
If you take the course at the college, then the students are required to have a valid driver’s license. They also get drug tested, so you know this person is clean. These are all things that I don’t see any other class room doing.
Training is something that needs to be taken seriously. My audio was bad at the end but Rick made a point to say that nothing on the tower is worth your life, so when working out there be sure to be safe and put your life first. Don’t take unnecessary risks.
Zayin Fiber Optic – providing optical networks design and consulting, instructor and leadership programs, organizational workforce development, and more.
FOA – The Fiber Optic Associationis setting the standard for approved training for FOA certification providing training in over 40 countries.
Heartland Solutions– providing a full range of communication construction and contracting services in the most safe, responsive, and efficient manner possible.
EXFO– providing test, service assurance, and network visibility to enable carriers to assess and optimize fronthaul and backhaul.
Primus– providing solutions to power business, education, and research. Connecting individuals and entire communities.
I appreciate all that Rick is doing and has done for the industry. He is watching TIRAP and the NWSA closely so he can be prepared to support both programs.
Can Sprint get back to #3? Boy, Sprint keeps telling us how great their network is, then they make announcements that they are going to put the minimal amount of money into the network. Trust me, if you are a Sprint vendor, you feel the pinch. They aren’t just driving the prices down, they just say “no, we really don’t need to expand or upgrade or improve” to most of the vendors out there. That’s OK because apparently they have a $10 Billion bond debt due in a few years. So why is it that all of the other carriers seem to be making money but Sprint can’t seem to do it? I was listening to RCR’s Martha DeGrasse talking to Iain Gillot about the Sprint situation. Sprint is really in trouble. Can Marcelo Claure make the difference? Can Softbank pull them back to #3? Can anyone help Sprint get out of debt? Does anyone know where all the money went?
So Sprint is pulling back the spend, no kidding. Did anyone bid on the NGN offer over a year ago? I worked it and what a waste of time. Holidays and weekends spent to make that company happy and they didn’t do anything really. I know that they are doing a little, very little.
So let’s look at what they are doing. They are removing the Clearwire Huawei gear and replacing it with 2.5G LTE gear, it’s about time. They are only doing this because they have to. It is part of the budget. The one thing I don’t see from Sprint is anything to do with VoLTE or SDN or anything to really bring the network to a LTE only network. I guess they are really counting on CDMA for voice will through 2020, it’s crazy that they have no money and yet they expect to maintain a legacy network. Way to go Sprint, well thought out. Spend less now so you can maintain legacy discontinued equipment 3 years from now. Good move genius! I guess if you don’t have the money to get new tires for your car, you hope it stays on the road until you have the money. Good luck with that!
So even though Sprint has a smaller workforce that the other guys and they seem to have a heavy management structure, I guess they can turn the ship around. I really hope so because it you look at T-Mobile; they seem to be making all the right moves. They are advancing their network, building out VoLTE, LTE, densifying, everything they need to do to sunset CDMA, saving them more money I the near future, and they have a great system. Verizon, which goes without saying, is not only doing all of this but they are building a network that is 5G capable, densifying, building out VoLTE, improving their services, and making it the shining example. Then you have AT&T who did put a lot of time and money into the network and continues to advance, but they think that they have plenty of coverage for now in most markets. They have been working on different deals but that means that they just haven’t been investing in the network the way I think they should be. Can they get back on track? Who knows, maybe they think their fine. Let Verizon lead the way.
What if Sprint declared bankruptcy? For one, Legere at T-Mobile would have a field day with a string of new commercials! For the industry it would be a major hit. All the stock prices would go down. Softbank might look really bad, but then they could re-organize the debt and manage it better. Would Softbank be able to keep its hold on Sprint? I think so, but they know it would be difficult and it may create more problems that solve them. They are already falling behind the technology race, (VoLTE and SDN) compared to the others who are racing to sunset CDMA. I don’t see them doing this until that $10B in debt comes due around 2020, and it would be a last resort, but it may save them.
Let’s play the “What if” game about a takeover!
We are pretty sure that the FCC and SEC in the USA would not let that happen unless Sprint would go into bankruptcy, but even then it seems more like Sprint mismanaged the money rather that a competition issue, so it may not happen even then. The government would really have to “pity” Sprint to make that happen. So who would take them over? When listening to Iain Gillot with Martha DeGrasse on RCR, it would have to be someone like Vodaphone. But wait! Softbank already took them over, and look how that’s going! So the takeover already happened, but was it the wrong partner? We all thought that Softbank would put money into Sprint, well, it doesn’t look at way. They are making Sprint think about every dime they spend, something that they should have been doing long before this. Let’s remember that Sprint was already taken over and it doesn’t seem to be pushing them ahead except for the fact they really seem to be making some good financial moves. They are working to get out of debt. So maybe Softbank is making the right moves. I just want them to move ahead with the network, but if you don’t have the money, you start positioning yourself to be more fiscally responsive, which Sprint does appear to be doing right now. Maybe Sprint needs to make these moves to save themselves.
The Network is Falling Behind
Yes, the network is falling behind but Sprint is trying to build the company back up. They are making moves that will help them get the money to do something again. People are looking at Network Vision like it was a failure, but they have a large network built the best way they could at that time. I could go into what they did wrong, but what’s the point. Now they are trying to build around what they have and move ahead. Unfortunately, it will put them behind all the big boys. They don’t seem to care. I think Sprint is so bad off financially that they need to make moves like this. All their previous moves put them here. Do you know that in 2018 they will have a 2015 network? Does that bother anyone? I know you think that the older network would be cheaper to run, but it’s really not, the LTE network is much cheaper to run that a combo LTE and CDMA costs more money to maintain and grow. It’s really better to sunset the older network to save on maintenance costs.
Comparisons:
Hey, we all see T-Mobile moving ahead quickly with LTE, and Verizon is always pushing ahead. AT&T has been spending money on other parts of the business, but they know they will have to keep pushing and all of those carriers see that VoLTE and NFV play an important role in sun setting CDMA. They all know that the sooner CDMA/GSM goes away the less money they have to spend to maintain an older system. They also know that LTE is a common system, soon becoming a commodity. It will be cheaper to build, easier to expand, and OEM interchangeable. The OEMs don’t like that but they understand that its part of progress.
All those companies should have everything in place for 5G. Sprint on the other hand, doesn’t seem to be moving anywhere with advancing the network for 5G, and I think it will hurt them. They think the network is good enough. I get it, financially they are trouble and they want to get back to good. Apparently they feel that to get back to good the network has to stay where it is, so that in 2020 they will have a 2015 network. This shows that the vision for the network is to maintain. I understand they have a small cell plan, and it may take hold in 2017 at the earliest. This will put them behind the rest.
What’s Next?
I hope they get back to good, seriously. Once that happens they can improve their network and become a leader again, but for now they just seem content to be #4. They have to realize that T-Mobile is building out their LTE network to be one of the best, densifying and moving to VoLTE, so they can sunset CDMA and start to decommission the old system. Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile all want to do this because the savings will be huge! LTE is already a commodity and the OEMs can already work in each other’s networks, so they will continue to drive down the costs of equipment. They created the turf system to drive vendors down, but they also see a decline in quality, (you made your bed, now lie in it).
One thing to think about, by the time Sprint builds out their NGN or small cell deployment or whatever they do, it looks like it will be too late to be cutting edge, in fact, they will deploy so far behind that catch up may not happen. It would be a complete replacement to get back to where the competition is. But hey, who cares, marketing will save them. If you can’t be the best be the cheapest, right, wasn’t that the original plan? By the way, how is that working out?
Listen, I am rooting for Sprint, I hope all the carriers succeed and grow, seriously. Sprint needs to become a major competitor. they won’t do it by sitting still. Standing still means you are falling behind, and that is never good in this industry. You know, they could always sell pagers, maybe that is going to be their niche, pagers, not phones.
In this show we have a small cell legend. Art KingofSpiderCloud, who had a great career in IT and made the move into carrier small cells for the enterprise. He actually had the idea for the enterprise small cell long before it was a thing. He would collaborate with the SpiderCloud gang before he even worked there with ideas and suggestions. Then he spoke about how he transitioned from Nike to SpiderCloud, who was lucky enough to snag this enterprise small cell visionary.
This guy has done a lot for indoor carrier coverage. Think about it, when 5G rolls out this will be the critical piece of the puzzle. He really understood Enterprise IT better than almost anyone. He saw that Wi-Fi would be the stepping stone to what the carriers can provide today.
Artbrings so much value and history for you to learn everything you can about the enterprise small cell and the evolution of indoor carrier wireless, from the licensed spectrum to LTE-U to MulteFire to 3.5GHz CBRS. It’s all good stuff, so you should set aside an hour and learn from this guy.
We discussed how the mobile phone evolved into the smart phone, thanks to the iPhone, Apple, (along with AT&T), was a game changer for the wireless industry even though Apple never made a base station, just the smartphone, the end device, and it changed the world when AT&T decided to sell it. Now most people can’t live without a smartphone in their lives. Art does a great job of explaining early iPhone and AT&T history and how it affected the enterprise wireless solutions. He was on the forefront of that revolution.
You will enjoy the stories that Art has to tell us, he goes through history of not only the enterprise IT, but wireless in general. If you have the time, then listen to the full interview. It is full of value!
I also asked who will pay for the enterprise small cell moving forward. I thought maybe the shift would happen in 3 to 5 years but he stated that it is much more immediate and brought up a study, http://scf.io/en/documents/162_-_Enterprise_demand_for_Small_Cells_by_vertical_market.php, where 30% of enterprises would pay for their own coverage in their buildings today. Even though 30% said they would never pay because it was up to the carriers However, there were 40% undecided but would consider it if the price and technology were right. With over 320,000 potential enterprise small cell customers in the USA, you can see the market is ready to boom.
I really would like to thank Art for taking the time to be on this call. He is a great guy that I was lucky enough to talk to at the NEDAS event in NYC in 2016. He was great to talk to and someone I am lucky enough to know. He is changing the future of enterprise and carrier wireless with his innovation and progressive ideas about the enterprise wireless evolution.
Follow Art on twitter, @ArtKinggto keep on top of his appearances. Art will be at PCIA the week of May 23rd, 2016. Amit Jain will be at TIA the week of June 6, 2016.
I met Steve at the NEDAS show and got to know him afterwards. He is an easy guy to talk to about wireless, we all love wireless. The groups he works with are really something. They are all there to help inform you, the wireless worker, about the wireless industry. DAS, Small Cells, and all things wireless. Your knowledge is growing well beyond what travels through the airwaves, now you have to know networking as well as the hardware and antennas to get it out there. Steve goes into how he saw the evolution of the networks go from having coverage to having bandwidth connectivity.
Steve is a founding board member of NEDAS, the Northeast DAS and Small Cells Association. They just had a conference that I went to, links here and here, that cover DAS and Small Cell issues and solutions. I am a big fan of NEDAS because you have a group of people that cover real world problems for DAS and Small Cell integrators. The system integrators are doing all that they can to install and implement these systems cost effectively and efficiently. That is no easy task when you have so many obstacles like permitting and aesthetics.
Steve is also a board member of the MD DC Wireless Association, MDDCWA. This wireless group gets together to keep the wireless leaders in the MD DC area stay informed. Pretty impressive.
He is also a founding member of Dense Networks, a group that is covering the consolidation of wireless, big data, and broadband. This group is helping the wireless industry understand the convergence of all the data formats into one seamless network. This is where you learn all that you can about where broadband is headed. Very impressive.
He is a smart guy, over 15 years of experience in distribution and emerging technologies, over 10 years at Tessco, and an Executive MBA degree from Loyola.
In this interview he tells us not only about the evolution of the wireless business but where it seems to be heading. Steve forming Dense Networks shows us how the convergence of Big Data & Analytics with Mobile Internet and the Internet of Things along with using the cloud will change the way we do business. Not only that but in wireless integration the system integrator will need to think differently about how to design and build the networks. The HetNet is going to be taken very seriously moving forward.
Wireless innovation is something that we often talk about but we don’t always worry about because most system integrators are worried about the immediate need for systems. They are trying to put together something that can be used right now. Technology is changing rapidly but we need to make the systems that are out there today work and be reliable. This is not easy task. While we want to focus on what’s next, we need to make today’s technology work the best we can for today’s customer. We also have to make plans to expand and improve for the future. It all becomes b=part of the formula. Steve is pretty good at explaining this.
This is a long interview, almost 50 minutes, so make some time to learn what makes the industry move forward with this innovator.
I would like to thank Steve for taking the time on a Saturday morning to talk to me. Once again, it shows his commitment to the wireless industry when this is the only opening for an interview. Most wireless innovators know it takes a deep commitment to not only be innovative, but to inspire the rest of us to learn and become better at this craft. Thank you Steve.
This is a sad day, in the tower industry. According to reports in The Washington Post and WJLA in DC, a climber fell and died from a tower near the WSSC treatment plant in Damascus, Md.
About 3Pm on Monday, May 16th the Montgomery police responded to a call and they are treating it like a workplace death.
Once again the FCC is working to improve broadband access in the USA. For that, I say thank you. This time they had a workshop to understand what DAS is and what small cells do. Hey, the FCC is busy trying to improve this wireless world for you!
So what did we learn? We learned that this is a great way to promote your company. Sorry, but that’s what many people did However, I did learn a lot from this.
Distributed Antenna System, DAS, is mostly associate with indoor coverage. Although, there is outdoor DAS where they deploy radio heads like they would small cells.
Small cells are really small cellular BTS systems that offer a low power, small foot print unit that can be deployed indoors or outdoors.
This workshop was a showcase of studies showing how the DAS and small cell solutions can provide a multitude of solutions for public safety and carriers.
For public safety, DAS provides first responders with indoor coverage so that the communications are reliable for anyone entering a building in an emergency situation can remain in contact with their teams. In today’s world this is absolutely critical. The desired signal for first responders is above -95dB. This should allow fire rescue, police, and emergency responders to maintain RF coverage in all cases. The way this is done in today’s buildings is to put the antenna and signal boosters inside the building. Critical communications are not cheap, but they are necessary if you value life. DAS creates this reliability and level of safety.
I am shocked that most municipalities don’t have written requirement for this. When I look around some states have taken this seriously while others don’t’ want to be bothered. Even after a major incident happens, the government doesn’t seem to react soon enough. If they make the requirements then they know that building owners will put it in because an inspector, usually the local fire department, could go out and approve this. An example of the sprinkler system was brought up and how they are in every large building now. It was a great analogy.
Carrier coverage is different. We all rely on our smart phones in today world for work and convenience. However, the carriers are no longer going to pay for the indoor coverage unless they see a large payback. They will only do it for large customers. The carriers say that broadband is a utility. So the carriers should be regulated like utilities, right? Sorry, just a quick dig there.
So the carriers want to have the building owners and businesses pay for their own small cells and DAS systems. I am fine with that but they need to find a way for these units to be deployed inside building with their support, but the way it is now they want to control it. That may change soon with the deployment of LTE-U.
Qualcomm’s MulteFire was mentioned several times. It seems like this may be the way that small cell coverage for multi carrier requirements may be the wave of the near future. MulteFire is a LTE-U format where it can run LTE in unlicensed spectrum without the licensed support. Apparently many companies are relying on this to move ahead.
One more thing that was covered extensively is the stealth deployment to make the municipalities happy. For outdoor, or even indoor, antennas have to be hidden to make people feel safe and make the companies look good.
I brought up the note that broadband is becoming a utility and that people expect it. Yet it was brought up again and again how when new buildings go up, broadband is generally an afterthought, not in the original plans. I believe they should replace the telco rooms with data rooms and allow for wireless and fiber access to buildings at the same time they plan electric and water access.
This wasn’t just all about public safety and carrier class. Wi-Fi was also brought up several times. Broadband is part of our life. It is more than a convenience. If you don’t believe me, then tell me how many of you don’t have Wi-Fi in your homes? If I drive through my neighborhood I see so many Wi-Fi hotspots because everyone around me has a Wi-Fi router in their house! Do you?
I also noticed how many people talked about outdoor small cells. Stealth is a huge topic. Power access is another issue that came up again and again. These are all things that make small cells expensive to deploy.
The expense was brought up again and again. Remember that no matter what you deploy you need to worry about zoning and permitting, power, looks, and backhaul.
If this subject interests you, then look at what the FCC put together. This is a great opportunity to learn from what they did. It can be a workshop for all of us.
In my last post I spoke ofDay 1, which was the shorter day, here is day 2. Like I said, great show and I made so many connections and met so many great people.
The videos of this can be found here, this way you can see the people that I have met!
This was my opportunity to learn from the best. NYC is one of the toughest markets to do business and one that you should not tackle unless you talk to these people first. It will help you break into the other markets and learn what to do and what not to so.
I want to personally thank all the people that worked so hard at the show and thank them for having me speak. I want to thank Ilissa, Amy, Jennifer, and Nikki for working so hard to make this happen. They did an outstanding job to make this a fabulous event!
The first session I saw was with moderated by Berge Ayvazian of Wireless 20/20 called “Digitizing Our Arenas”. His panel included Ihab Labib of JMA Wireless, Jay Maciejewski of PC Tel, Marc Patterson of Boingo Wireless, and Matthew Thompson of Cobham Wireless. They brought up some great points and challenges of working with the larger venues. They also pointed out that you don’t just build it but it constantly needs upgrades and modifications and additional equipment, just because its built doesn’t mean that it’s final. There is so much you have to worry about, growth, improvements, new spectrum, new formats. It really is an ongoing job.
Next was “Capacity Planning, Technology Developments” moderated by Jordan Fry of Snyder and Snyder, LLP. This panel had Chris Pleibel of Perfect-10 Wireless, David Evans of AT&T and IEEE, Dean Fresonke of ClearSky Technologies, Mark Parr of Bandwidth Logic, and Russ Hamm of Rainbow Broadband. This group covered the need for more bandwidth and how many companies constantly grow and the upgrading of the systems is never-ending. Again, none of this is an easy process as you need to anticipate the growth and do the best you can. You also need to make sure that the supply chain is in place and things keep moving so that the integration of systems keeps moving.
Session 3: Fiber to the X, trends, challenges, and solutions to meet the wireless demand. This session was moderated by Stephen Banks of KMB Design Group, LLC. This roundtable had Art Malierdirk of INOC, Craig Doyle of CommScope, Ken Strandfeld of SOLiD, and Ray LaChance of ZenFi. They talked about the fiber solutions for customers and how fiber is needed as the backbone for wireless solutions. We need the backbone to be solid and reliable whether we are going to the core or connecting to another site. Reliability of the fiber is a key ingredient to making the wireless work a success.
Next there was a presentation, The Edge, Where the end-user resides, by Doug Wiest of EdgeConnex which I thought was done very well to because Doug pointed out the connection possibilities of indoor and outdoor small cells and DAS systems. Doug talked about the growth of the wireless network and what it is today in such a short period of time. From wireline to wireless to the edge. Pittsburg in 2019 will use as much as DC does today. The growth is phenomenal! Well done Doug!
Steve Yapsuga of Tessco led us into the “Integrator Solutions: How and integrator works on an End-User’s behalf. This group was done as a fireside chat and had Douglas Fishman of SQUAN, Edward Donelan of Telecom Infrastructure Corp, Raymond duTremblay of Building Technology Systems, and Tom Chamberlain of Westell had a roundtable on integration issues and ways to overcome them. I found it to be informative and based on real world experience.
Then Mike Sapien of OVUM gave a special report, “Search for a Seamless Enterprise Experience” which covered the coverage that the enterprise users expect and what they really get. It seems that they rely heavily on Wi-Fi because it’s readily available and easy to install. They want carrier coverage, but carriers won’t support them. He also brought up the public safety aspect where people rely on indoor coverage that is reliable and seamless for work and public safety.
Next, Ken Sandfeld of SOLiD talked about “The MiddlePrise: They’re not too big and not too small but aren’t just right.” He spoke of the edge and how all the services were moving there. NFV is taking over! The edge could be the tier 1 carrier or the rural end-user, especially in today’s IOT environment. He estimates this market will be over $20 Billion in the near future.
Persistent Telecom talked about how the systems of today have very different needs of the systems of years gone by. For instance, their case studies show that. Lori talked about how the network is more than a convenience but many people rely on this network to keep their businesses afloat. Everyone in that room relies on their devices to stay on top of their business. Chris has a study of a stadium where a stadium not only put DAS in but they had to continuously do upgrades to keep up with technology. He brought up the Wi-Fi systems and their upgrades. While his study was for a high-rise he said it applies to the enterprise. Robin talked more about the public safety aspect of carrier systems and how mission critical relies on their phones as much as anyone even when things go bad. They need to stay live regardless of the disaster. Scope of Work Tutorial.
Then Phil Lawson of EdgeConnex did a talk on “The Edge part 2” which covered the evolution of technology and how quickly things are progressing within the last 20 years. It’s like on steroids! Can we keep up with the demand for change? Costs are dropping and demands are rising in technology. Now Social Media is making the demands, it is no longer a convenience but a necessity.
After that came my session, Developments in Mobile Antenna Technology, hosted by Mike Sapian of OVUM with Art King of SpiderCloud, Gregg Toback of Anritsu, Bob Langston of Advanced RF Technology, and me! We talked more about the technology of not only antennas but the system from beginning to end. Greg brought up how the testing is essential and if you miss the important steps of testing then you could have so many time-consuming problems that will eat into your bottom line. I have seen it, grounding and testing are better to be done up front! Bob brought up the amazing RF issues that you could run into and he had real live examples of the problems that you could have with the antennas and aesthetics. This is a show stopper and if you need to replace the antenna then you need a new RF design and not only that but it will eat into the budget. Then Art spoke about small cell market for the carriers which is a game changer because this product can all be Ethernet attached and the MIMO antennas connect the people in the building with low power. He spoke of what he did for Verizon Wireless and the demands that they made. He also talked about the interfacing they could do with Cisco that made installation quick and easy. I talked about deployment of course and all the potential problems you could run into. We discussed design considerations and potential problems and ways to avoid issues. We also talked about real world problems and what can be done to prevent them next time.
The final roundtable was the “Carrier Conundrum” where Joshua Broder of Tilson headed off the session of Dominick Vileco of V-Comm, LLC, Maureen Hopkins of Tilson, Steve Weiss of Verizon Wireless, and Robert Gaudioso of Snyder and Snyder spoke about the wireless right of way, ROW, and what to look for. For one, these are all very smart people with in-depth real world experience and legal expertise speaking of the ROW deployments for small cells and all the obstacles that deployments run into. The municipalities could delay things for a very long time, literally years, if you don’t do things the right way up front. If you think you can push an installation through, going around the municipality, guess again. This session covered the major issues that have prevented outdoor small cells from taking off. For one, you have no idea how much time these people have to put in to get things moving ahead. Most municipalities have no interest in letting them install nor do they care. They also spoke of utility pole installations, very interesting. They also spoke of how important the site survey was to see what is really there, this is something I always bring up and yet it’s something that the carriers often want to cut out to save cost. Do it right the first time!
The last presentation was the “Investor Insights” where we heard from Richard Lukaj from Bank Street who spoke of how the IOT would really propel the business because data distribution is becoming critical He spoke of the growth trends in the industry as we head into the 5G era where the industry will continue to grow.
Remember that they have many upcoming events, you can see them all at www.nedas.com, but to list a few, July 3rd they will be in Boston, September 21 they will be in Washington DC, and in October they will be in Toronto. Go to www.nedas.com to see them all. If you want to know more about small cells and DAS and learn from the best, I suggest attending these events!
Deploy with the Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS to show you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute without the mistakes.
Keven is a great guy, someone who can articulate his points about drones for commercial use very well. I really enjoyed talking to him and I think you will learn a lot from what he tells us. He is candid and honest when he talks about drones and regulations here in the USA.
toughest markets to do business and one that you should not tackle unless you talk to these people first. It will help you break into the other markets and learn what to do and what not to so.
