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Tuesday, January 25, 2022

3GPP Release-18 Work Moves Into Focus as Release-17 Reaches Maturity

In early December 2021, 3GPP reached a consensus on the scope of 5G NR Release-18. With the 3GPP Rel-17 functional freeze set for March 2022, Release-18 work is moving into focus. This is being billed as a significant milestone marking the beginning of 5G Advanced — the second wave of wireless innovations that will fulfil the 5G vision. Release 18 is expected to build on the solid foundation set by 3GPP Releases 15, 16, and 17, and it sets the longer-term evolution direction of 5G and beyond.

(click on the image to enlarge - PDF here)

The 3GPP Release-18 page has a concise summary of all that you need to know, including the timeline. For anyone interested in going through features one-by-one, start navigating from here, select Rel-18 from the top.

For others who may be more interested in summary rather than a lot of details, here are some good links to navigate:

  • Nokia whitepaper - 5G-Advanced: Expanding 5G for the connected world (link)
  • Paper by Ericsson researcher, Xingqin Lin, 'An Overview of 5G Advanced Evolution in 3GPP Release 18' (link)
  • Marcin Dryjański, Rimedo Labs - 3GPP Rel-18: 5G-Advanced RAN Features (link)
  • Bevin Fletcher, FierceWireless: Next 3GPP standard tees up 5G Advanced (link)

As always, Qualcomm has a fantastic summary of 5G evolution and features in 3GPP Release-18 on their page here. The image above nicely shows the evolution of 5G from Release-15 all the way to Release-18. The image below shows a summary of 3GPP Release-18, 5G-Advanced features.

They also hosted a webinar with RCR wireless. The webinar is embedded below.

The slides can be downloaded from GSA website (account required, free to register) here.

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Tuesday, January 18, 2022

3GPP 5G Non Terrestrial Networks (NTN) Standardization Update

We have looked at 5G Non Terrestrial Networks (NTN) in many different posts in our blogs. If you are new to this topic then this tutorial with a video is a good place to start or just follow this IEEE Comsoc article or this short update from R&S here.

Nicolas Chuberre is the rapporteur of the NR_NTN_solutions work item (TSG RAN) and of the FS-5GET study item (WG SA1) from Thales Alenia Space. In the October 2021 issue of 3GPP Highlights newsletter, he along with Munira Jaffar, Lead delegate representing EchoStar and Hughes Standards in ESOA (EMEA Satellite Operators Association) Standards Working Group, wrote a summary of 'Status of NTN & Satellite in 3GPP Releases 17 & 18'.

Quoting from the article:

The approval of normative activities on Non-Terrestrial Networks (NTN) in Rel-17 has generated growing interest in the topic. The Rel-17 NTN work items are supported by a wide range of vendors (terminal, chipset, network), as well as service providers from both the mobile and space industries and vertical user groups including ESOA.

The Rel-17 NTN and satellite work items in Technical Specification Group (TSG) RAN and TSG SA have been progressing towards the goal of satellite inclusion in 3GPP technical specifications. The focus is on transparent payload architecture with FDD systems where all UEs are assumed to have GNSS capabilities. The normative phase includes adaptation to the physical & access layer aspects, radio access network and system architecture, radio resource management, and RF requirements for targeted satellite networks operating at LEO, MEO or GEO orbits.

With an expected completion date of March 2022, the 3GPP Rel-17 specifications will support New Radio (NR) based satellite access deployed in FR1 bands serving handheld devices for global service continuity. Equally exciting, the 3GPP Rel-17 specification will support NB-IoT and eMTC based satellite access to address massive Internet of Things (IoT) use cases in areas such as agriculture, transport, logistics and many more. 

This joint effort between mobile and satellite industries will enable the full integration of satellite in the 3GPP ecosystem and define a global standard for future satellite networks. This will address the challenges of reachability and service continuity in unserved/underserved areas, enhance reliability through connectivity between various access technologies, and improve network resilience and dependability in responding to natural and manmade disasters.

Upon completion of Rel-17 the long-awaited standard for satellite networks serving handheld devices should be in place by 2022, with commercial product availability expected sometime in 2024. Including satellite as part of the 3GPP specifications will support the promise of worldwide access to 5G services and drive explosive growth in the satellite industry. 

Looking ahead, ESOA members and other NTN stakeholders have started discussions during the 3GPP Rel-18 June workshop and are continuing to work on a further list of enhancements for both NR-NTN and IoT-NTN to be considered in Rel-18. Plans are also underway to further define the enablers for NR based satellite access in bands above 10 GHz to serve fixed and moving platforms (e.g., aircraft, vessels, UAVs) as well as building- mounted devices (e.g., businesses and premises). The goal of these efforts is to further optimize satellite access performance, address new bands with their specific regulatory requirements, and support new capabilities and services as the evolution of 5G continues.

At Mobile Korea 2021, Nicolas Chuberre gave a talk on '3GPP NTN standardization: past, current and future'. The talk nicely summarizes Release-17 progress and the features planned for 3GPP Release-18. His talk is embedded below:

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Tuesday, January 11, 2022

An Introduction to Minimization of Drive Testing (MDT)

Over the last few years, Ralf Kreher has done some fantastic posts on Minimization of Drive Testing (MDT) on this blog (links at the bottom of this post). To complement that, here is a basic introductory tutorial looking at what exactly is meant by MDT and how it's done. 

Video embedded below:

The slides from the presentation are available here.

Please check out our 3GPP SON Series videos here.

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Tuesday, January 4, 2022

What is RF Front-End (RFFE) and why is it so Important?

As more technologies, frequency bands, antennas, etc., are crammed in our smartphones and tablets, it becomes essential for these devices to keep performing despite what technologies and spectrum are in use at any instant of time. This requires specialist design of the RF front end in our devices. Wikipedia explains it as:

In a radio receiver circuit, the RF front end, short for radio frequency front end, is a generic term for all the circuitry between a receiver's antenna input up to and including the mixer stage. It consists of all the components in the receiver that process the signal at the original incoming radio frequency (RF), before it is converted to a lower intermediate frequency (IF). In microwave and satellite receivers it is often called the low-noise block downconverter (LNB) and is often located at the antenna, so that the signal from the antenna can be transferred to the rest of the receiver at the more easily handled intermediate frequency.

Qualcomm is very active in this area as can be seen from the chart in the Tweet above. Back in October, Qualcomm announced ultraBAW, their new generation of micro acoustic filter technology that expands their RF front-end (RFFE) portfolio and opens up new 5G services and applications. They have a short intro video explaining RFFE:

It is also interesting to see from the Tweet above that on an average baseband + RFFE + connectivity chips cost Apple nearly $55 per device.

The analyst firm CCS Insight have also done some good work explaining RFFE and their analyst Wayne Lam has written a few detailed articles on this topic. Here are the links if you want to read further:

  • Advances in RF Front-Ends Made 5G Phones Possible (link)
  • Advances in 5G RF Front-Ends Lead to Longer Battery Life (link)

Their RFFE videos playlist is embedded below.

Also worth noting that a good modem and RF front-end, especially with 5G, can make a lot of difference in what speeds and coverage you can get

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