Patent ID: 7127175

Claim:
A network comprising: a plurality of antennas optically coupled to a plurality of base transceiver stations which are configured to provide cellular transmission; a plurality of links that couple the plurality of antennas and the plurality of base transceiver stations, a plurality of optical transmission paths that span at least one link of the plurality of links; and a plurality of low latency passive or switching components coupled to the plurality of links to provide multiplexing and routing; the transmission paths being provided by a plurality of optical carriers, each transmission path coupling one antenna with one base transceiver station, each transmission path carrying an uplink or downlink digital signal representative of a respective segment of wireless spectrum that is associated with a respective operator, at least one link of the plurality of links providing multiple transmission paths between at least one of the plurality of base transceiver stations and at least one of the antennas, the at least one link being shared by at least first and second operators, with the first operator utilizing one transmission path and the second operator utilizing a different transmission path, at least one transmission path configured to carry all spectrum of a selected bandwidth, with the network being configured to provide for different operators using at least one of: (a) different optical fibers strands of the network, (b) different optical wavelengths on a same fiber strand of the network and (c) different wavelengths on the network, and wherein the multiple transmission paths on a single link connect multiple different geographic locations, each holding at least one of the plurality of base transceiver stations, to multiple different geographic locations, each holding at least one of the plurality of antennas.