5ESS®-2000 switch cellular gateway

U. S. cellular networks continue to expand exponentially, with subscriber growth increasing more than 30 percent per year, while international wireless networks are experiencing even more remarkable growth, with many world networks expanding more than 100 percent per year. The growth in the subscriber base and service demand clearly carries with it a corresponding and similar growth in the network equipment used to provide wireless/cellular services. And, as networks grow in size, their trunk connectivity, mobile call delivery, and internode signaling become more complicated. As a result, some of the larger cellular network operators are implementing a hierarchical network structure that incorporates a cellular gateway switch to optimize trunking and signaling links. This paper describes the cellular gateway switch and how it is being used to resolve the problems associated with large cellular networks. A brief overview of a cellular service network is given, followed by a comparison of the switching node call traffic loads and trunking requirements of a theoretical network, with and without a cellular gateway switch.