Smart Cells are radio access nodes that provide wireless connectivity across multiple spectrum ranges and technologies. As of January 2014,

Macrocell A macrocell or macrosite is a cell in a mobile phone network that provides radio coverage served by a high power cell site (tower, antenna or mast). Generally, macrocells provide coverage larger than microcell. The antennas for macrocells are mo ...

s, Small Cells, and Wi-Fi connections were the primary means of data connectivity. For these types of cells, the spectrum utilized is static and is based on the antenna installed. ''A Smart Cell may transmit multiple frequencies and technologies which are controlled by the software and not the hardware'' (antenna). ''Smart Cells'' are currently in the research and development stage, but support

software-defined networks Software-defined networking (SDN) technology is an approach to network management that enables dynamic, programmatically efficient network configuration in order to improve network performance and monitoring, making it more like cloud computing t ...

, which are proliferating the current mobile network structure, are being supported. It's possible that ''Smart Cells'' will lower capital and operational costs due to reduced equipment and manual manipulations needed to modify cell site coverage. The term ''Smart Cell'' is also used to identify other technologies that enhance cell sites where it has reduced the need to manually manipulate radio access equipment or add additional carriers at a radio access node''.''

References

Smart devices Mobile telecommunications Radio communications {{Tech-stub