Federated Wireless, the premier provider of CBRS spectrum sharing services, has announced the release of the company’s new Spectrum Exchange service. This service is aimed to supplement CBRS General Authorized Access (GAA) availability by enabling Priority Access License (PAL) holders to lease out their unused spectrum to non-PAL holders. Through an automated portal, similar to Airbnb, enterprises with PALs can publish pricing, terms, and location options, as well as conduct transactions with non-PAL holding potential lessees, all without direct engagement with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Federated Wireless has been a leading player in the private wireless networks market in the United States since the commercialization of CBRS band 48. The company has many offerings for enterprises and partners with leading cloud providers, AWS and Microsoft Azure, offering private networking Connectivity-as-a-service solutions through these providers’ online marketplaces. Of the 150,000+ CBSD/Access Points deployed on the CBRS spectrum today, Federated Wireless has deployed over 70,000 to operators, enterprises and government agencies. Some of these deployments include: remote learning in the city of McAllen, Texas; the development of a 5G smart warehouse for the Marine Corps in Albany, Georgia; a plug-and-play private LTE network at Carnegie Mellon University for intelligent video analytics (in partnership with AWS). Today, Federated has around 220 customers and is continuing to expand in the CBRS market. The company recently announced a collaboration with Anterix, the majority holder of 900MHz spectrum, to combine 900MHz and CBRS spectrum offerings for utility and energy companies that need additional spectrum to cover wide power grids.

In regards to Federated’s new Spectrum Exchange offering, CTO for Federated Wireless, Kurt Schaubach, likened the service to Airbnb for CBRS Priority Access Licenses,

“Lots of Priority Access Licensees do not need the entire geography covered by their PAL and [with Spectrum Exchange] can monetize the extra by exchanging PAL rights through an online portal directly with enterprises who want private networking.”

Industries with defined areas, such as venues/arenas, oil refineries, college campuses, and manufacturing facilities are ideal users for this service as their operations don’t coincide with the PAL boundaries. This service is unique to Federated Wireless and Schaubach notes,

“Enterprises have an economic incentive to lease out, because if they don’t use the entire PAL, it can be reassigned as GAA.”

As the CBRS market continues to expand and more enterprises become interested in private networking through shared-spectrum models, innovative solutions like the Spectrum Exchange will emerge as ways for additional available spectrum to be optimized. Federated Wireless is at the forefront of the CBRS spectrum-sharing model and is fully-invested in its future development. The company is an FCC-approved Spectrum Access System (SAS) administrator for CBRS, with a spectrum control solution that touts 99.999% availability and a coastal sensing network for managing priority license access. Federated Wireless also offers online training for CBRS Certified Professional Installer certifications with the goal to empower network service providers and system integrators with CBRS network operating knowledge that will drive future growth of the market.