Not far from the Sèvres factory, two imposing trucks run throughout the national domain of Saint-Cloud. On its roof, the immense branches that come in reinforcement to allow those attending the rock festival in Sena to benefit from a mobile network adapted to their uses.
For Lives Tiktok or Instagram, to send memories of their favorite artists in social networks or loved ones, during great events such as rock in Seine, Lollapalooza or Hellfest, telecommunications companies are increasing operations. This involves dedicated equipment, trucks, therefore, especially installed not far from the two main scenes of the festivities and that have the latest technologies.
The risk of saturation
4G, 5G, but also 5G SA (or “+”, according to the marketing name) … Many relay antennas are organized along a 36 -meter high pylon. In the key, exceptional and quite shared flows among those who will participate in the event.
Because the risk, if there are no additional antennas, it is very quickly to reach the blocking point in the existing ones: “What is happening at the festivals, is that these are often places that are not made to receive so much audience, so we have a very strong influence. Except that all antennas are not dimensioned, then they saturate, Omar Naoouar, director of free action.
To succeed in this Force tour, the operators are working in order. This is the case of Free, which is a rock partner in Sena, even in its Internet infrastructure. To get there, the operator equipment must attract the fiber to the truck used as a Mobile Central Management: “It is a real challenge to find the closest point to take it to sometimes exotic places.” Among these places, the festival began in rock, for which Free had to draw more than a kilometer of fiber.
The tension is maximum during this operation, because the fiber is fragile: “The challenges is to know how to pull it protecting it.” The operator ensures that he can take care of it in 48 hours.
A truck designed internally for free
The situation has also changed over the years. Festivals, aware of the boom in social networks and the “lives” made on this occasion by the spectators, now request operators: “The need is for both parties (operators and events, note of the editor). In free, we need to bring a network for our subscribers and festivals need this network for everything that is associated with the event, such as payments, Wi -Fi, etc.” “
An operation that gives fruit: according to free mobile data, at festivals, data requests exploit. “We see it, in the traffic curves on Radio Bay (in the truck), we see peaks depending on the artists and moments, even more when an artist plays with the public.”
Among the peaks of use, the Hellfest is a good first: “I don’t know what people do with their phone in Hellfest, but it’s incredible,” pleasant Omar Nauar. Under the antenna, a truck, therefore, calibrates the whole. It is observed 24 hours a day with a tender team in case of a problem. The industrial secret of obligations, a photo is not possible, but the long and thick cables come to connect the entire device to the fiber. A little jewel of technologies, designed internally.
It remains to be seen if these efforts manage to convince a client to subscribe to a particular operator, but in Free Mobile, we are quite sure: “I do not know if it is an argument, but what is certain is that a free subscriber that goes to the festival, he will tell his colleague or his friend, that the next time, if it is not too free, in reality it is not understood that nothing is understood.
Source: BFM TV
