US: Amazon Shows More Interest in 3.5 GHz Wireless Networks

Amazon.com claimed it plans to increase testing in the 3.5 GHz CBRS spectrum band, but the company continues to keep the information of those trials under the cape of secrecy. However, many of the brand-new locations where Amazon is testing networks in the band are near its business workplaces.

Ecommerce giant Amazon has formerly indicated its interest in wireless networks running in the 3.5 GHz CBRS band. IEEE Spectrum reported in 2015 of several Amazon requests to examine 3.5 GHz procedures in 2 places in California. Then, just last month, the business claimed it would certainly carry out 3.5 GHz tests in Sunnyvale, Calif., which GeekWire kept in mind is where Amazon’s Lab126 product growth subsidiary is headquartered. The publication said that Amazon’s Lab126 is where the firm created items such as itsKindle ebook viewers as well as Kindle Fire tablets.

In its newest filing to the FCC asking for authorization to carry out extra tests, Amazon acknowledged that it’s planning to “conduct preliminary tests near its facilities located in Sunnyvale, California, so that it could obtain sufficient data to determine whether to continue and expand its research into CBRS technologies at other locations.” The firm claimed it is asking for consent to perform extra testings “so that it will certainly be prepared to increase its research study as necessary to 3 various other locations (in Arlington, VA; Herndon, VA; as well as Seattle, WA) and to proceed its research study at its first location in Sunnyvale.” The locations in Herndon and Seattle that are detailed in Amazon’s application are near its corporate offices, but the location noted in Arlington is in the Crystal City area near the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, as well as does not seem near any kind of Amazon workplaces.

Need for private mobile network.

Nonetheless, Amazon’s test might be associated with its strategies to use cloud-native, exclusive mobile networks in the CBRS band to developers, telecommunications drivers, public sector operators, business and also others “for fast implementation of Industrial IoT applications, such as real-time security, smart meters and worker safety tracking.” The firm announced that offering– together with partners Athonet, CommScope’s Ruckus and Federated Wireless– at its AWS re: Invent event previous years.

A number of wireless players are considering the private wireless network possibility in the 3.5 GHz band and also other range bands. Such networks guarantee to offer dedicated mobile solutions to the similarity energies, mining business and also others that are not based on public wireless networks from the likes of AT&T and Verizon.

The 3.5 GHz band has been hailed as “Goldilocks range” because it offers simply the ideal equilibrium between coverage and also capacity. Due to the propagation characteristics of transmissions in mid-band spectrum like the CBRS band, signals can take a trip for miles and also pass through structures while also bring a considerable amount of data.

The CBRS band will initially be opened to unlicensed uses, but the FCC just recently stated it would certainly hold 3.5 GHz spectrum auctions starting in June of 2020, leading the way for 70MHz of certified operations to run alongside the fifty percent of the band that’s devoted to unlicensed procedures.