From satellite imagery to tool-ready RF layers

5G cells reach 300 to 500m and die on line-of-sight, so RF planning cannot run on 2D centerlines. It needs building heights, vegetation, terrain and clutter, captured with enough precision that a planner can trust a line-of-sight call from the desk. rfMAP exists to produce exactly that data, and to keep producing it for new areas on demand.

The way to get there is a repeatable pipeline. Every stage below feeds the next, from raw imagery to a registered, tool-ready dataset, so the same standard holds whether you take an off-the-shelf city or commission a made-to-order area.

The extraction step is where rfMAP earns its name. Vegetation is captured as stacked polygons with height attributes, and buildings as per-building multi-polygon detail rather than simple blocks, so the surfaces that block or carry a signal are represented as they really are. Clutter is the layer that lets a planning tool understand the ground itself.

3D buildings and vegetation heights drive line-of-sight and signal-blocking decisions. DTM and DSM/Clutter Height give terrain and surface elevation. 2D vectors carry roads, rivers and coastline, and 4D bridges add structures that 2D maps miss. Clutter classifies the land-use morphology a propagation model needs.

Together they let a planner work on a faithful 3D scene instead of a centerline abstraction, which is what shortens the path from plan to a decision a field team can act on.

Several satellite angles on one tile converge into measurable buildings, vegetation and terrain, registered to ground. The photogrammetry step, made literal: this is the dataset RF planning tools then read.

Much of the world is already mapped, so for many programs the dataset exists today. Lepton's mapping spans 128 countries and 3150 cities, the footprint behind a 3D dataset that powers more than 95% of India 5G deployment.

When an area you need is not in the off-the-shelf set, the same GIS services arm that builds the catalogue can produce it: photogrammetry and image processing techniques, run through the same pipeline to the same standard. The capability is made-to-order mapping of new areas on demand.