Globe Telecom Inc. and Finnish communications and fintech firm Nokia have deployed state-of-the-art sustainable antennas in South Cotabato, the first of at least 50 installations planned for this year to support its continuing network expansion and enhancement of mobile services for customers.
Nokia produced the interleaved passive active antenna (IPAA+) for Globe as a sustainable, low footprint and high capacity 4G/5G antenna to support smooth site upgrades across the country.
“Through this innovation, Nokia will help us lessen our cost of energy and carbon emissions. Kudos to Nokia for collaborating with our Globe engineers to come up with this new solution. That’s the kind of partnership we can be proud of,” said Yoly Crisanto, Globe chief sustainability and corporate communications officer.
By using antenna interleave technology, Globe saves some 1.5 meters of tower height space.
Crucially, it does not increase the wind load on the tower, speeding up site acquisition and making deployment easier and faster. The impact on cell site is minimal as tower reinforcement and construction works are typically not needed, reducing the environmental impact during site modernization and deployment of 5G technology.
The world-first testing of the 2.6 GHz IPAA+variant in Tantangan, South Cotabato showed a 5 percent improvement in efficiency compared to legacy antennas. Further, as the IPAA+enables a wider coverage area, it also has the advantage of supporting more end-users.
“Nokia is proud to partner with Globe and support their efforts to deliver the most sustainability driven network in the Philippines. Through this unique IPAA+ variant, we are supporting Globe’s effort to reduce its environmental footprint as well as accelerate its 4G/5G rollout across the country to improve the connectivity experience of its customers,” Subho Mukherjee, vice president for sustainability at Nokia, said.
“We will continue to work closely with them throughout deployment at approximately 50 additional sites this year in the Visayas and Mindanao islands,” Mukherjee added.
The IPAA deployment demonstrates Globe’s commitment to adopting green network solutions as it contributes to halving global carbon emissions by 2030 and attain net zero by 2050.
To date, 25 of Globe’s high-energy utilization facilities run on renewable energy.
