News

MatSing has announced a new deployment at the Xcel Energy Center, a 20,500-capacity arena that serves as home of the Minnesota Wild.

By: Brad Randall, Broadband Communities

Fans of the National Hockey League (NHL) will notice improved mobile connectivity this year at the Xcel Energy Center.

The boost in connectivity at the arena, which serves as home ice for the NHL’s Minnesota Wild, was announced today by MatSing, an innovator of high-capacity lens antenna technology.

The Xcel Energy Center, based in St. Paul, accommodates roughly 1.7 million visitors annually and hosts 150 sports and entertainment events per year, according to MatSing CEO Bo Larsson.

MatSing’s Sept. 26 announcement stated that the deployment was made possible thanks to a collaboration with American Tower, a global leading digital infrastructure provider.

American Tower utilized MatSing’s lens antennas “as part of the new Distributed Antenna System (DAS) deployment in their neutral-host network,” MatSing’s release explained.

As a result of the improvement, attendees and fans at the Xcel Energy Center will now benefit from multi-carrier and multi-band 4G LTE and 5G connectivity across all four of the arena’s seating levels.

“One of our key differentiators is that our lens antennas deliver high sectorization to ensure comprehensive coverage and capacity in any venue from the fewest possible antenna locations,” said Larsson. “At Xcel Energy Center, for instance, we are pleased to deliver venue-wide connectivity via only nine antenna locations.”

The lens antennas will first be turned on for the preseason home opener of the Minnesota Wild against the Winnipeg Jets, scheduled for Sept. 27, MatSing’s release stated.

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