Orange Cameroon commenced operations in Cameroon’s telecommunications space in 1999 and has been a major player in providing communication services. The operator has deployed fixed wireless broadband infrastructure extensively, making it one of the country’s foremost service providers.
Assessing the challenges
The constantly evolving internet space has required the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications (MINPOSTEL) and the Telecommunications Regulatory Board (TRB) to continually engage operators and ISPs to standardise their services.
Frequent interruptions in service because of poor performance of existing network infrastructure, high latency and poor monitoring views of the network were the setbacks faced by Orange when it came to managing the network. Orange needed to ensure performance by adopting an appropriate fixed wireless broadband solution that would be efficient in spectrum utilisation, robust, and able to curb latency.
Adopting fixed wireless
Orange Cameroon was introduced to Cambium Networks’ ePMP platform by Greenline Technologies, a value-added distributor with a presence in more than 10 African countries. A 45-day trial was completed during which seven links of several products across the ePMP access point and subscriber portfolio and 450b subscriber modules were installed by SIS Networking – a telecommunications system integrator – with the details of installation.
Prior to installation, the LINKPlanner design tool was used to plan the network, and the results guided the engineers on the field to execute the survey and the installation. The monitoring and maintenance process was made even easier with the use of the cnMaestro NMS which gives a 360-degree view of the network.
The outcome of the trial was Orange ordering a significant number of links of the F300-19R subscriber module. ePMP is part of the Cambium ONE Network, which simplifies operations by providing one secure IT experience, transforming the network from a collection of disparate parts to a unified architecture. The platform integrates WiFi, switching, network security, SD-WAN and outdoor fixed wireless infrastructure into a single framework managed by cnMaestro cloud management.
Next Steps
Orange Cameroon envisions increasing its infrastructural deployments by integrating other Cambium Networks products into the network. The deployment of wireless solutions is quickly accelerating, and easy-to-deploy solutions such as Cambium Networks stands out in the technology space.
“Orange Cameroon is impressed with the link as the capacity and performance achieved is satisfactory. This platform will sustain increasing demands in capacity needs for years to come,” said Abdallah Nassar, network engineering and development director, Orange Cameroon. n
