RJio to develop 5G small cell network solutions for global players

Reliance Jio is not only aiming at the local 5G market, but is also developing its own small cell radio network, which it plans to offer to global players. Sources in the know told BusinessLine that Reliance’s 5G network stack will focus on small cells, thus allowing Jio to carry out urban densification on its indigenous technology and provide small cell radios to global vendors.

In the recently concluded annual general meeting for Reliance Industries, Mukesh Ambani announced a partnership with global chip maker Qualcomm, which invested nearly $100 million in Reliance Jio’s parent company, Jio Platforms, for a 0.15 per cent equity stake in 2020.

Reliance Industries Chairman, Mukesh Ambani noted in his August 29 speech: “I’m confident that the solutions developed jointly by Qualcomm and Jio, once proven in India, can be taken to the rest of the world.” Sources in the know say that the partnership is mostly geared towards the global chip-maker providing the Indian telco with the technological know-how to develop small cell 5G network solutions.

Qualcomm offers technological capabilities in improving mobile coverage and increasing network capacity with Qualcomm 5G and 4G RAN (Radio access platforms) platforms (small cells). According to the Qualcomm website, Qualcomm 5G and 4G RAN platforms are uniquely suited to deliver next-generation indoor and outdoor networks at scale by offering architecture flexibility (scaling to vRAN), power-efficient design (PoE opportunity), and global spectrum band support (including 5G mmWave and sub-6).

The source noted that Qualcomm will be sharing these capabilities with Reliance Jio to develop its own indigenous small cell network stack in 5G. “Here, there is an opportunity to take on the larger global vendors such as Nokia and Ericsson that focus on the deployment and innovation of larger high-power base stations and have not paid much attention to small cells.” Qualcomm is also leveraging 5G to develop other capabilities such as laptops and tablets connected by 5G, and these could also be the future avenues that it can explore with Reliance Jio through collaboration, according to experts.

Small cells are portable miniature base stations that require minimal power to operate and can be placed every 250 meters or so throughout cities. To prevent signals from being dropped, carriers could blanket the city with thousands for such stations. They would form a dense network that acts like a relay team, handing off signals like a baton and routing data to users at any location.

The massive data capacity of a 5G network will require carriers to increase network densification making small cells instrumental for 5G. Mukesh Ambani also hinted in his AGM address that the telco will have global ambitions with its indigenously developed network solutions.

Reliance Jio and and Qualcomm did not reply to BusinessLine’s e-mails at the time of filing the story. The Hindu BusinessLine