| 79 RURAL SERVICES » Rural Connectivity Group RCG is a joint venture by New Zealand’s three mobile service providers; Spark, One NZ, and 2degrees, with RCG’s build programme helping to extend high-speed wireless broadband to 99.8 percent of New Zealanders. The Government has provided capital funding for the Rural Broadband and Mobile Blackspots programmes, along with Spark, One NZ, and 2degrees, and is managed by Crown Infrastructure Partners. Through these programmes, RCG cell sites now provide coverage to over 32,500 households, 1,000 kilometers of state highway, and more than 100 tourist sites such as Milford Sound, the Routeburn Track, East Cape Lighthouse, and Cape Reinga. RCG Acting CEO Ian Hooker says, “It’s been a very rewarding project for the RCG team, working in some of the most beautiful parts of New Zealand and with local communities who are so grateful to receive fast 4G wireless broadband and mobile services”. “The feedback we have received from rural people has been outstanding due to the fact that our work has such a positive impact on their daily lives. We’ve heard many stories from grateful communities about how our connectivity is helping them in their daily and business lives. The services our cell sites deliver make businesses more efficient and make rural working environments such as farm and forestry blocks safer. Lives have been saved with access to 111 emergency calls. One RCG cell site had multiple 111 calls made from it, in the first week the service was operational; that just shows how vital these services are,” Ian says. RCG’s work covers the full length and width of the nation, with their programme of work completing over 50 sites each, in remote areas of Northland and Southland. The Chatham Islands is another area that has been provided mobile services and 111 calling for the first time by a new network of five cell sites and a satellite earth station built by RCG in 2021, during the worst of the Covid pandemic. The link back to New Zealand is via a satellite positioned 35,000kms above the Chatham Islands, enabling these critical wireless services to be provided. Ian says, “The RCG network is the first in the world where three mobile providers have worked together to build a shared infrastructure network; we’re a great example of what industry and government collaboration can achieve.” Most of the mobile components for the RCG network are manufactured by Nokia, including the radio access network equipment, which is required on every site. The utilisation of Nokia’s MOCN (Multi-Operator Call Network) technology allows a single cell site to send a signal to customers of all three network providers and return the information for billing and customer services by Spark, One NZ, and 2degrees. This complex technical solution provides a commonsense outcome to provide mobile coverage to rural areas where the cost of building three separate towers in each location is prohibitive. Building in challenging terrain requires a team of industry experts from site selection and acquisition, engineering design expertise, and the quality of components and equipment required to build a cell site. The towers RCG build need to withstand all types of weather conditions, including snow, and corrosive sea salt in coastal locations. For the challenging terrain, Christchurch-based pole manufacturer Spunlite was chosen for its expertise in designing long-life steel poles suitable for all sorts of conditions. All Spunlite poles are manufactured locally, in Otautahi, Christchurch, and utlised across the RCG network to deliver connectivity to rural communities across Aotearoa. From industry-leading collaboration to world-first technical design and quality components used in building each cell site, the RCG has led the way across the telecommunication industry to deliver a life-changing cellular network delivering 4G connectivity to rural New Zealanders. The services the cell sites deliver make farm and forestry blocks safer. Nokia is proud to be providing the technology for RCG to deliver rural connectivity to Aotearoa New Zealand nokia.com/about-us/company/worldwide-presence/asia-pacific-and-japan/
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