Mobile Operators Prefer Fiber to Wireless Backhaul, Says Analyst

Carriers are choosing fiber over wireless backhaul, but wireless transport may grow, Mobile Experts said in a Friday news release and report. "Leading operators take this position because top mobile operators … have several LTE bands with overlapping plans to upgrade small cells,” said analyst Joe Madden. “They have a long-term view, like a roadmap, and they're not calculating ROI based on a single upgrade.” By 2022, 16 percent of small cells will use wireless transport, predicted Madden. “There is potential growth in wireless transport, as operators are starting to discover the limits of the utopian 'all fiber' deployment.”