C Spire, Mimosa Partner on 5G Fixed Wireless Broadband Push Across Mississippi

C Spire and Mimosa Networks have announced that they are working together on a 5G fixed wireless initiative in Mississippi designed to extend broadband internet access service to more consumers and businesses.

As part of an initiative designed to reach tens of thousands of consumers and businesses with affordable broadband internet, C Spire is deploying Mimosa’s sub-6 GHz equipment and technology solutions in neighborhoods, small towns and cities across the state.

C Spire operates the nation’s largest privately held wireless communications company and is one of the nation’s leading broadband and cloud service providers. In addition to fixed wireless broadband, C Spire offers consumers and businesses voice, video, home internet, wireless, business services, cloud and managed services solutions.

With a vision of transforming Mississippi one neighborhood at a time, C Spire is targeting its 5G fixed wireless internet service to hundreds of neighborhoods over the life of the initiative.

C Spire is focused on providing the Magnolia state’s unserved and underserved population with the fastest time-to-market and activation of service, while delivering up to 120 Mbps speeds at an affordable price. Both business and consumer subscribers in the targeted neighborhoods, cities and towns will have access to the service.

After several field trials and an extensive technical evaluation, C Spire partnered with Mimosa to develop the industry-leading, cost-competitive technology, which offers hybrid-fiber-wireless (HFW) solutions, using client antennas and access point base stations to extend C Spire’s extensive 8,400 route miles of buried fiber network at the edge of most Mississippi neighborhoods.

Mimosa’s HFW solutions can be rapidly deployed, with client antennas about one third the size of a satellite dish. C Spire’s 5G internet offering provides subscribers with speeds of up 120 Mbps. C Spire offers the service for $50 a month with no data caps and no long-term service contracts and low latency ideal for applications like gaming, streaming and video calling.

“Mimosa offered us an ideal solution for our 5G internet deployments,” said C Spire President Stephen Bye. “Not only are Mimosa products incredibly easy to deploy, they also offer the reliability and value we were looking for. We appreciate Mimosa’s leading-edge technology, industrial design and flexibility, enabling us to meet the requirements of both residential and business subscribers.”

C Spire is deploying Mimosa solutions in neighborhoods using short-range MicroPoP architectures and in limited tower deployments. The deployment includes Mimosa A5 and A5c access devices, Mimosa C5 client devices, and Mimosa N5-360 beamforming antennas.

“In addition to Mimosa’s innovative engineering and small form factor, the scalability and throughput of the products really impressed us,” Bye said. “We are providing customers with 120 Mbps internet access at a cost they love because of the densities we are able to achieve. This is all about extending our fiber network into more places faster and more places than we can bring fiber alone.”

Bye said C Spire has been impressed with Mimosa’s vision, roadmap, direction and noted that both companies are collaborating on future technology solutions. In addition, Mimosa has been active in Washington, D.C. as a leader of the Broadband Access Coalition (BAC) and is continuing to work with the FCC to free up unused spectrum for fixed wireless initiatives.

“We’re thrilled and honored to partner with C Spire on such an important technology initiative for the state of Mississippi,” said Mimosa CEO Brian Hinman. “Both companies share a desire to connect more people in Mississippi in the fastest time to market and at the lowest cost for deployment. With this initiative, C Spire subscribers can enjoy a high-speed internet experience at a fraction of the cost.”

Massive broadband deployment is a key part of a broader C Spire Tech Movement initiative designed to leverage the company’s technology leadership and investments to help transform Mississippi. Expanding tech innovation and education in the areas of robotics, artificial intelligence, internet of things, augmented and virtual reality, machine learning and telehealth are also top priorities for the company, Bye said.