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3GPP Long-Term Evolution (LTE) Technical Specifications Approved
Varying claims are being made in the marketplace today about the availability of LTE technologies.
The Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) announced that 3GPP has approved the LTE Terrestrial Radio Access Network technology specifications and are now under change control, leading to their inclusion in the forthcoming 3GPP Release 8.
LTE supporters, including Vodafone and Ericsson had estimated in 2007 that LTE would be completed by the end of the year; a date that the international partnership missed by three weeks.
3GPP LTE is an evolution of the GSM/UMTS (comprising WCDMA, HSPA) systems family. Work on evolving the 3G mobile cellular systems within 3GPP started in November 2004.
LTE utilizes a radio air interface technology known as Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiple Access (OFDMA), also found in competing technology Mobile WiMAX (based on the IEEE 802.16e-2005 and ETSI HiperMAN standards). OFDMA is being used in both the uplink and downlink channels for WiMAX, while LTE is will use OFDMA in the downlink and SC-FDMA (Single Carrier - Frequency Division Multiple Access) in the uplink path.
Ironically, opponents to Mobile WiMAX claim that OFDMA technology is unproven. Now OFDMA is officially part of the evolutionary path that those same vendors will be developing product solutions for. Is OFDMA now proven because it is part of LTE? It will be entertaining to see how companies whose previous business agendas dictated OFDMA-bashing 'evolve' with the addition of OFDMA to their future product portfolios.
Key benefits of the LTE specification are touted as better, faster, and cheaper than current 3G systems - specifically increased peak data rates, increased cell edge performance, reduced latency, scalable bandwidth, co-existence with GSM/EDGE/UMTS systems, reduced CAPEX and OPEX.
Varying claims are being made in the marketplace today about the availability of LTE technologies. Some operators, such as US carrier Verizon Wireless, have said they expect to start trials of LTE at the end of 2008, while major equipment manufacturers and market analyst firms expect compliant and interoperable networks commercially available in 2010-2011. Commercial LTE networks are expected to become available after WiMAX Forum Certified networks based on 802.16e-2005 technologies are available, but before certified equipment for WiMAX2/WiMAGIC based on IEEE 802.16m.
By Jeff Orr, ORR Technology
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