Although they don’t know yet whose fans will be the recipients of their services at the Super Bowl in Minneapolis on February 4, Sprint has been actively building out a network to handle the terabytes of data streaming from the site.
Sprint, according to a recent press statement, is using a brand new DAS system with more than 800 antennas inside the stadium, powered by Sprint small cells. Their small cells use high-band 2.5 GHz spectrum. In addition, they’re using two-channel carrier aggregation, an LTE-Advanced technology that doubles network capacity by creating even wider lanes for more network traffic.
Small cells installed on lamp posts and street lights (pictured above) are also adding more capacity throughout the city. By game day, Sprint will have installed nearly 200 small cells across the greater Minneapolis-St. Paul area, including inside and around U.S. Bank Stadium as well as other venues.
Outside the stadium, Sprint has also deployed a small cells DAS to pump up capacity and speeds across the parking lots, and upgraded or installed new indoor systems at the Hyatt Regency, Minneapolis Convention Center, Target Center, Minnesota State Fair Grounds, Excel Energy Center and other venues.
The carrier is also deploying a Sprint Magic Box, “the world’s first all-wireless small cell” as they call it, in hundreds of locations across Minneapolis-St. Paul. Sprint Magic Box is a plug–and–play LTE small cell that boosts indoor data speeds on average by 200 percent.
Lastly, the carrier is using three-channel carrier aggregation for wider traffic lanes on nearly 400, 2.5 GHz cell sites across Minneapolis-St. Paul and upgraded hundreds of cell sites in the market to include all three of their spectrum bands – 800 MHz, 1.9 GHz and 2.5 GHz.
Last year on game day, Sprint customers used nearly five terabytes of data inside and directly around NRG Stadium. They are anticipating that number to double, at a minimum, for Super Bowl Sunday 2018.
January 18, 2018
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