Last Thursday, our friends at the Northeast DAS & Small Cell Forum hosted the Philadelphia in-building community for the first of their famous happy hour socials in this region. The gathering took place at Market Street’s Revolution House. Spirits were high and the conversation flowed into the evening – overall a great gathering for the ecosystem!
It was great seeing many new faces and the participation of new companies, bringing the local in-building community together. Creating new ties, making new friends, and exploring new opportunity avenues – this is what the Northeast DAS & Small Cell Forum is all about.
The newly formed NYC DAS & Small Cell Forum brought together the NYC area’s in-building industry professionals last night at their official kick off social. OEM’s, SI’s and Operators were all well represented and iBwave was there too. The rooftop cocktail, held at the iconic 280 Park Avenue South, was a great opportunity for the forum’s founding members to network while taking in the Manhattan skyline.
The NYC DAS & Small Cell Forum was created in order for area in-building professionals to gather, network and collaborate together with the higher goal of educating NYC hospitals, universities, and building owners on the importance of deploying in-building wireless networks into their real estate projects. The forum plans on the holding the next event on September 20. iBwave is proud to be a founding member of the forum and we look forward to future initiatives!
Check out last night’s party! Play the video and see the pictures below:
Nathalie Robitaille, VP Marketing at iBwave with other NYC DAS Forum members
All founding members of NYC DAS received a Labrot & Graham, Woodfort Reserve, Distiller’s Select Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whiskey, with a certified bottle number. Nice!
It’s time for Wi-Fi and DAS co-existence – that was the popular consensus during the two-day DAS in Action forum that took place from April 10 to 11 in Atlanta, Georgia. The DAS Forum organizers say this year’s attendance increased by 85 percent, a result attributed to the growing role distributed antenna systems play in North American network deployments.
Day 1 of the event began at the Marriott Marquis, where iBwave’s Engineering Solutions Director, Vladan Jevremovic, took part in a morning panel discussion, Indoor RF Design and Planning: Optimizing the Ideal Network. Dr. Jevremovic discussed the importance of having a centralized information depository system for network projects. “When technicians receive a network trouble ticket, they need access to all relevant and current documentation to understand the core of the problem. Having quick and easy access to this information helps technicians resolve the problem much faster,” he said.
Panel participants – Indoor RF Design and Planning: Optimizing the Ideal Network
Georgia Aquarium
Many noted that 2012 is a big year for the in-building wireless industry. While no one expected to play games on their wireless devices just five years ago, now it has come to be expected. Data traffic is both growing and changing at the same time. These days upload traffic at large venues has caught up with the number of downloads. During the Wi-Fi and DAS panel, AT&T’s Hany Fahmy explained that while deploying small cell solutions were necessary, Wi-Fi is just as important in this data-hungry age. He added both have their own sweet spot and are needed to manage increased data traffic.
After some great discussions, a case study on the Georgia Aquarium, the world’s largest aquarium, was presented by AT&T, Connectivity Wireless Solutions and Commscope. In 2011, the team took on the challenge of upgrading the existing DAS network to 4G, also expanding the network to encompass the new Dolphin Tail show area. It was a whale of a feat to accomplish – the site’s unique marine environment made for an equally diverse RF environment. Managing the reflections coming off 10 million gallons of water, which were impacting propagation results, was one thing. But installers also worked the night shifts so as not to disturb the sea creatures (dolphins are light sleepers). And all work came to a halt when penguins and seals were escorted by making their way to vet appointments.
DAS In Action Networking Session
Georgia Aquarium
The entire event was an informative one. During the Wi-Fi and DAS panel, CCI Systems’ Peter Murray observed that iPads have become the new desktops, and smartphones, the new laptops. Indeed a new paradigm shift has taken place. Convergence was the buzz word – many agreed working with heterogeneous networks more efficiently will be the best way to deal with the high data traffic.
