South African operator Comsol has launched a 5G FWA (Fixed Wireless Access) network to meet the need for business-class broadband for SMEs. The company claims the service as a cost-effective, reliable redundancy option for enterprises. Comsol's CEO said the new 5G FWA offering complements Comsol's existing FWA portfolio of broadband products. The company has spent the past five years refining a 5G offering that would both be commercially viable and meet local business needs.
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Comsol's 5G FWA Offering
"Now we can cater for a portion of the market we were not able to cater for in the past," Comsol said, adding that, "The enterprise-grade product has been designed to offer low contention throughput, so effectively we are guaranteeing the data rate delivered to an organisation. This is coupled with reliable power infrastructure and dual fiber feeds to drive mission-critical applications."
Differentiation from Consumer-Grade 5G
The company said its 5G FWA product is uncapped and available in 25 Mbps, 50 Mbps, and 100 Mbps speeds. Comsol explains that its business-class 5G FWA product is markedly different from consumer-grade 5G. "We are bringing the latest technology in this space overlaid on business-grade telco infrastructure, power resilience, and dual backhaul. We built our own 5G ecosystem from the core – the brains of the network, through to the radio access network, and the end devices – the fixed CPEs."
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Network Redesign and Infrastructure Upgrade
"Ahead of the launch, we redesigned our whole network to cater for the increased power consumption of 5G. We also upgraded our power infrastructure to provide 24-hour autonomy on our base stations, ensuring that a customer's services don't go down during load shedding," the company added.
Furthermore, the company highlighted that, "From a radio frequency perspective, our 5G service uses outdoor CPEs instead of indoor routers that consumer services use. This delivers optimal performance, with uplink speeds multiple times better than you might find with a poorly positioned indoor router. We designed the entire network and infrastructure so customers get what they pay for."
Regional Launch
The Comsol 5G service will initially launch in the Gauteng region, with coverage to be extended over the course of the next year. The company said it is currently selecting preferred wholesale partners who will work with resellers and installers to roll out the new product.
