This article appeared in Microwaves & RF and has been published here with permission.
Increased network capacity, extended range, and less latency in enterprise and industrial IoT networks are all among the touted benefits of the Antenna Company’s new Wi-Fi 6E MIMO antenna system. The system enables simultaneous operation in the 2.4-, 5-, and 6-GHz frequency bands, resulting in an additional 1.2 GHz of spectrum (the unlicensed portion from 5.925 to 7.125 GHz) and greater than 2X increase in available channels.
Optimized for seamless integration into access points, the antenna system’s design supports a total of 15 antennas, including dedicated 4x4 5-GHz + 4x4 6-GHz + 4x4 2.4-/5-GHz Wi-Fi antennas. Cross-pair Wi-Fi antenna isolation of greater than 45 dB is achieved for concurrent operation in the 5-GHz band.
An additional 0.9-/2.4-GHz IoT antenna is included to enable IoT use cases, along with tri-band 2.4-/5-/6-GHz antennas for radio spectrum management. The entire antenna system is mounted on a metal backplate to enable mechanical, thermal, and RF integration with the access point.
The design also comes with an ultrawideband (UWB) option to enable Real-Time Location System (RTLS) services such as access control, indoor navigation, asset tracking, and contact tracing. The UWB antennas support channels 5 and 9 for worldwide spectrum coverage. To avoid coupling and detuning between antennas, the system achieves greater than 30 dB of isolation between the UWB and Wi-Fi antennas.
Other features of the Wi-Fi 6E + UWB antenna system include:
- A compact design that enables size reduction of enterprise access-points by 20% or more without sacrificing antenna system performance.
- Low input impedance essential to achieve peak data rates for 80/160-MHz channels.
- Uniform radio coverage to avoid nulls and blind spots.