TechKnowledge Technology Stories (Series 1)

TechKnowledge is a series of Technology Stories looking at how technology has evolved over the years and how it will continue to evolve in the future. The series is targeted at youth looking to understand how technology has been evolving and how it will evolve further. It is our intention to make a ten part series but as of yet only four parts are complete. 

Part 1: 'Smaller, Faster, Cheaper and More…' looks at how technology has evolved by things getting smaller, faster, cheaper and much more. It investigates Moore’s law and how it has helped create a future technology roadmap.

Part 2: 'Connecting Everything Everywhere…' discusses different connectivity options available to connect various devices, gadgets and appliances to the internet. It highlights the fact that this is just the beginning, and everything that can be connected will eventually get connected.

Part 3: 'Satellites - Our Friends In The Sky…' discusses the fact that they are our friends and helpers in the sky. In discusses how satellites are useful as a connectivity option, how it helps us map and navigate, how we can use location based services, how we can watch broadcast video or listen to broadcast radio, and last but not least, how satellites are helping us observe and monitor the earth. 

Part 4: 'Devices and Gadgets - Our Companions and Life Savers…' looks at the fact that we use a variety of electronic devices/gadgets in our everyday lives to make it more convenient, efficient, and even keep us connected. From smartphones and laptops to smart home appliances and wearable tech, these devices simplify tasks, enhance productivity, and provide instant access to information and communication. They help us manage work, stay in touch with loved ones, and access entertainment on the go. Gadgets like fitness trackers promote healthier lifestyles, while others automate household chores, saving time and energy. Overall, the connected devices & gadgets have become essential tools in modern life, blending seamlessly into our routines and transforming how we live and interact.

The playlist of the videos is embedded below:

The slides can be downloaded from here.

Related Posts: 

• 3G4G: Free 2G, 3G, 4G & 5G Training Videos
• The 3G4G Blog: Explaining Telecoms
• The 3G4G Blog: Short Tutorial on Mission Critical Services in LTE and 5G
• The 3G4G Blog: Private Networks Introductory Series
• The 3G4G Blog: A Quick Introduction to 3GPP
• The 3G4G Blog: 5G and Cyber Security
• The 3G4G Blog: Tech Quotes we should know about - #TechQuotes
• The 3G4G Blog: Tech Laws we should all know about - #TechLaws 

New 3GPP Release-17 Study Item on NR-Lite (a.k.a. NR-Light)

3GPP TSG RAN#84 was held from June 3 – 6, 2019 at Newport Beach, California. Along with a lot of other interesting topics for discussion, one of the new ones for Release-17 was called NR-Lite (not 5G-lite). Here are some of the things that was being discussed for the Study item.

In RP-190831, Nokia proposed:

• NR-Lite should address new use cases with IoT-type of requirements that cannot be met by eMTC and NB-IoT:
• Higher data rate & reliability and lower latency than eMTC & NB-IoT
• Lower cost/complexity and longer battery life than NR eMBB
• Wider coverage than URLLC
• Requirements and use cases –
• Data rates up to 100 Mbps to support e.g. live video feed, visual production control, process automation
• Latency of around [10-30] ms to support e.g. remote drone operation, cooperative farm machinery, time-critical sensing and feedback, remote vehicle operation
• Module cost comparable to LTE
• Coverage enhancement of [10-15]dB compared to URLLC
• Battery life [2-4X] longer than eMBB
• Enable single network to serve all uses in industrial environment
• URLLC, MBB & positioning

The spider chart on the right shows the requirements for different categories of devices like NB-IoT, eMTC (LTE-M), NR-LITE, URLLC and eMBB.

The understanding in the industry is that over the next 5 years, a lot of 4G spectrum, in addition to 2G/3G spectrum, would have been re-farmed for 5G. By introducing NR-Lite, there would be no requirement to maintain multiple RATs. Also, NR-Lite can take advantage of 5G system architecture and features such as slicing, flow-based QoS, etc.

Qualcomm's views in RP-190844 were very similar to those of Nokia's. In their presentation, the existing 5G devices are billed as 'Premium 5G UEs' while NR-Lite devices are described as 'Low tier 5G UEs'. This category is sub-divided into Industrial sensors/video monitoring, Low-end wearables and Relaxed IoT.

The presentation provides more details on PDCCH Design, Co-existence of premium and Low Tier UEs, Peak Power and Battery Life Optimizations, Contention-Based UL for Small Data Transmission, Relaying for Wearable and Mesh for Relaxed IoT

Ericsson's presentation described NR-Lite for Industrial Sensors and Wearables in RP-191047. RP-191048 was submitted as New SID (Study Item Description) on NR-Lite for Industrial Sensors and Wearables. The SID provides the following details:

The usage scenarios that have been identified for 5G are enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), massive machine-type communication (mMTC), and time critical machine-type communication (cMTC). In particular, mMTC and cMTC are associated with novel IoT use cases that are targeted in vertical industries. 

In the 3GPP study on “self-evaluation towards IMT-2020 submission” it was confirmed that NB IoT and LTE M fulfill the IMT-2020 requirements for mMTC and can be certified as 5G technologies. For cMTC support, URLLC was introduced in Release 15 for both LTE and NR, and NR URLLC is further enhanced in Release 16 within the enhanced URLLC (eURLLC) and Industrial IoT work items.

One important objective of 5G is to enable connected industries. 5G connectivity can serve as catalyst for next wave of industrial transformation and digitalization, which improve flexibility, enhance productivity and efficiency, and improve operational safety. The transformed, digitalized, and connected industry is often referred to as Industry 4.0. Industrial sensors and actuators are prevalently used in many industries, already today. Vast varieties of sensors and actuators are also used in automotive, transport, power grid, logistics, and manufacturing industries. They are deployed for analytics, diagnostics, monitoring, asset tracking, process control, regulatory control, supervisory control, safety control, etc. It is desirable to connect these sensors and actuators to 5G networks. 

The massive industrial wireless sensor network (IWSN) use cases and requirements described in TR 22.804, TS 22.104 and TS 22.261 do include not only cMTC services with very high requirements, but also relatively low-end services with the requirement of small device form factors, and/or being completely wireless with a battery life of several years. 

The most low-end services could already be met by NB-IoT and LTE-M but there are, excluding URLLC, more high-end services that would be challenging. In summary, many industrial sensor requirements fall in-between the well-defined performance objectives which have driven the design of eMBB, URLLC, and mMTC. Thus, many of the industrial sensors have connectivity requirements that are not yet best served by the existing 3GPP NR technology components. Some of the aforementioned requirements of IWSN use cases are also applicable to other wide-area use cases, such as wearables. For example, smart watches or heath-monitoring wearables require small device form factors and wireless operation with weeks, months, or years of battery life, while not requiring the most demanding latency or data rates. 

IWSN and wearable use cases therefore can motivate the introduction of an NR-based solution. Moreover, there are other reasons why it is motivated to introduce a native NR solution for this use case: 

• It is desired to have a unified NR based solution.
• An NR solution could provide better coexistence with NR URLLC, e.g., allowing TDD configurations with better URLLC performance than LTE.
• An NR solution could provide more efficient coexistence with NR URLLC since the same numerology (e.g., SCS) can be adopted for the mMTC part and the URLLC part.
• An NR solution addresses all IMT-2020 5G frequency bands, including higher bands and TDD bands (in FR1 and FR2).

The intention with this study item is to study a UE feature and parameter list with lower end capabilities, relative to Release 15 eMBB or URLLC NR, and identify the requirements which shall be fulfilled. E.g., requirements on UE battery life, latency, reliability, connection density, data rate, UE complexity and form factor, etc.  If not available, new potential NR features for meeting these requirements should further be studied.

There were other description of the SID from Samsung, ZTE, etc. but I am not detailing them here. The main idea is to provide an insight for people who may be curious about this feature.


Related Posts:

• 3G4G Training: Introduction to NR-Light a.k.a. NR-Lite
• The 3G4G Blog - 3GPP 5G Standardization Update post RAN#84 (July 2019)
• The 3G4G Blog - Ultra Reliability: 5x9s (99.999%) in 3GPP Release-15 vs 6x9s (99.9999%) in 3GPP Release-16
• The 3G4G Blog - 5G SpeedTests and Theoretical Max Speeds Calculations
• The 3G4G Blog - Updated 5G Terminology Presentation (Feb 2019)

A quick case study on Smartwatches

My presentation from the Cambridge Wireless Connected devices SIG event "On Trend – High Fashion meets High Technology" held today, is embedded below. One of my favourite ads that highlights our fascination with the smart watches has been shown very well in a advert by Samsung mobile USA as follows:



I believe there is an opportunity and a market for the smart wear and smartwatches. There is a need for just the right kind of products to capitalise on the demand.