Mobile backhaul networks have had to bear the brunt of performance and capacity improvements at the RAN level at least since 3G started to boost data rates and especially with 4G LTE. Now 5G is ratcheting the pressure up by another order of magnitude. The industry’s research community has been working on further optimization improvements for some years now. The fruits of such endeavors are starting to emerge and be ready for deployment alongside 5G roll-outs. Operators now understand clearly, in the wake of their LTE experiences, that mobile backhaul cannot be considered in isolation but should be planned and optimized in concert with enhancements to the whole end-to-end infrastructure from the core to the RAN. Changes in cell site…