Cambium Networks bolsters wireless broadband capacity with Elevate access solution
Imhoff said that wireless Internet service providers (WISPs) have been the quickest to embrace the ePMP Elevate platform, but it is also attracting attention from critical-communication sectors.
“Electric utilities that use 802.11-based fixed-wireless broadband for meter monitoring or physical access control outside of substations can and will make use of it, as well,” Imhoff said. “The other likely user—outside of WISPs—is municipal government.
“Municipal governments used fixed broadband quite extensively for video-surveillance transport and for bringing broadband to remote facilities, be it the playground or the snack shack on a municipal golf course. But there’s really a high volume around video-surveillance cameras. As you know, there are always more cameras, and those cameras are consuming higher data rates with higher-resolution video content.”
All ePMP Elevate networks can be managed by Cambium’s cnMaestro platform, which also can be used to manage Cambium microwave backhaul solutions from an ePMP access point. Currently, ePMP Elevate operates on 5GHz unlicensed spectrum, but a 2.4 GHz version is slated to be released in April, Marcham said.
Imhoff said he is pleased with the market reception for ePMP Elevate, noting that the company has seen a “shift from experimentation to adoption” of the product since its introduction in late November.
Marcham echoed this sentiment.
“We do see very positive customer feedback, particularly for the rather effortless way of upgrading,” he said. “People aren’t used to seeing such a large increase in performance from just a software upgrade and the hardware on the access-point side.”