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3GPP Long Term Evolution

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LTE (Long Term Evolution) is the last step toward the 4th generation (4G) of radio
technologies designed to increase the capacity and speed of mobile telephone networks. Where
the current generation of mobile telecommunication networks are collectively known as 3G (for
"third generation"), LTE is marketed as 4G. Most major mobile carriers in the United States and
several worldwide carriers have announced plans to convert their networks to LTE beginning in
2009. LTE is a set of enhancements to the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System
(UMTS) which will be introduced in 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Release 8.
Much of 3GPP Release 8 will focus on adopting 4G mobile communications technology,
including an all-IP flat networking architecture. On August 18, 2009, the European Commission
announced it will invest a total of €18 million into researching the deployment of LTE and LTE
Advanced.[1]

While it is commonly seen as a mobile telephone or common carrier development, public safety
agencies (and US Intelligence Services)[citation needed] in the US[2] have also endorsed LTE as the
preferred technology for the new 700 MHz public-safety radio band. Agencies in some areas
have filed for waivers[3] hoping to use the 700 MHz[4] spectrum with other technologies in
advance of the adoption of a nationwide standard.

Contents
[hide]

• 1 Overview
• 2 Current state
• 3 Timetable
• 4 An "All IP Network" (AIPN)
• 5 E-UTRAN Air Interface
o 5.1 Downlink
o 5.2 Uplink
• 6 Frequency bands and channel bandwidths
• 7 LTE Device Testing Challenges
• 8 Technology Demos
• 9 Carrier adoption
• 10 See also
• 11 References
• 12 Further reading
• 13 External links for more information
 o 13.1 3GPP Projects and Presentations
o 13.2 Specifications
o 13.3 Industry reaction

o 13.4 Whitepapers and other information

[edit] Overview
The LTE specification provides downlink peak rates of at least 100 Mbps, an uplink of at least
50 Mbit/s and RAN round-trip times of less than 10 ms. LTE supports scalable carrier
bandwidths, from 20 MHz down to 1.4 MHz and supports both Frequency Division Duplexing
and Time Division Duplexing.

Part of the LTE standard is the System Architecture Evolution, a flat IP-based network
architecture designed to replace the GPRS Core Network and ensure support for, and mobility
between, some legacy or non-3GPP systems, for example GPRS and WiMax respectively.[5]

The main advantages with LTE are high throughput, low latency, plug and play, FDD and TDD
in the same platform, improved end-user experience and simple architecture resulting in low
operating costs. LTE will also support seamless passing to cell towers with older network
technology such as GSM, cdmaOne, W-CDMA (UMTS), and CDMA2000.

[edit] Current state

While 3GPP Release 8 is an unratified, formative standard, much of the Release addresses
upgrading 3G UMTS to 4G mobile communications technology, which is essentially a mobile
broadband system with enhanced multimedia services built on top.

The standard includes:

• Peak download rates of 326.4 Mbit/s for 4x4 antennas, 172.8 Mbit/s for 2x2 antennas for
every 20 MHz of spectrum.[6]
• Peak upload rates of 86.4 Mbit/s for every 20 MHz of spectrum.[6]
• 5 different terminal classes have been defined from a voice centric class up to a high end
terminal that supports the peak data rates. All terminals will be able to process 20 MHz
bandwidth.
• At least 200 active users in every 5 MHz cell. (specifically, 200 active data clients)
• Sub-5ms latency for small IP packets
• Increased spectrum flexibility, with spectrum slices as small as 1.5 MHz (and as large as
20 MHz) supported (W-CDMA requires 5 MHz slices, leading to some problems with
roll-outs of the technology in countries where 5 MHz is a commonly allocated amount of
spectrum, and is frequently already in use with legacy standards such as 2G GSM and
cdmaOne.) Limiting sizes to 5 MHz also limited the amount of bandwidth per handset
• Optimal cell size of 5 km, 30 km sizes with reasonable performance, and up to 100 km
cell sizes supported with acceptable performance
 • Co-existence with legacy standards (users can transparently start a call or transfer of data
in an area using an LTE standard, and, should coverage be unavailable, continue the
operation without any action on their part using GSM/GPRS or W-CDMA-based UMTS
or even 3GPP2 networks such as cdmaOne or CDMA2000)
• Support for MBSFN (Multicast Broadcast Single Frequency Network). This feature can
deliver services such as Mobile TV using the LTE infrastructure, and is a competitor for
DVB-H-based TV broadcast.
• PU2RC as a practical solution for MU-MIMO. The detailed procedure for the general
MU-MIMO operation is handed to the next release, e.g., LTE-Advanced, where further
discussions will be held.

A large amount of the work is aimed at simplifying the architecture of the system, as it transits
from the existing UMTS circuit + packet switching combined network, to an all-IP flat
architecture system.

[edit] Timetable
In December 2008, Rel-8 specification was locked. In January 2009, the ASN.1 code was
locked. The standard has been complete enough that hardware designers have been designing
chipsets, test equipment and base stations for some time. LTE test equipment has been shipping
from several vendors since early 2008 and at the Mobile World Congress 2008 in Barcelona
Ericsson demonstrated the world’s first end-to-end mobile call enabled by LTE on a small
handheld device.[7] Motorola demonstrated a LTE RAN standard compliant eNodeB and LTE
chipset at the same event.

[edit] An "All IP Network" (AIPN)

Next generation networks are based upon Internet Protocol (IP). See, for example, the Next
Generation Mobile Networks Alliance (NGMN).[8]

In 2004, 3GPP proposed IP as the future for next generation networks and began feasibility
studies into All IP Networks (AIPN). Proposals developed included recommendations for 3GPP
Release 7(2005),[9] which are the foundation of higher level protocols such as LTE. These
recommendations are part of the 3GPP System Architecture Evolution (SAE). Some aspects of
All-IP networks, however, were already defined as early as release 4.[10]

[edit] E-UTRAN Air Interface

Release 8's air interface, E-UTRA (Evolved UTRAN, the E- prefix being common to the evolved
equivalents of older UMTS components) would be used by UMTS operators deploying their own
wireless networks. It's important to note that Release 8 is intended not just for use over E-UTRA,
but is also indended for use over any other IP network, including WiMAX and WiFi, and even
wired networks.[11]
The proposed E-UTRAN system uses OFDMA for the downlink (tower to handset) and Single
Carrier FDMA (SC-FDMA) for the uplink and employs MIMO with up to four antennas per
station. The channel coding scheme for transport blocks is turbo coding and a contention-free
quadratic permutation polynomial (QPP) turbo code internal interleaver.[12]

The use of Orthogonal frequency-division multiplexing (OFDM), a system where the available
spectrum is divided into many thin carriers, each on a different frequency, each carrying a part of
the signal, enables E-UTRAN to be much more flexible in its use of spectrum than the older
CDMA based systems that dominated 3G. CDMA networks require large blocks of spectrum to
be allocated to each carrier, to maintain high chip rates, and thus maximize efficiency. Building
radios capable of coping with different chip rates (and spectrum bandwidths) is more complex
than creating radios that only send and receive one size of carrier, so generally CDMA based
systems standardize both. Standardizing on a fixed spectrum slice has consequences for the
operators deploying the system: too narrow a spectrum slice would mean the efficiency and
maximum bandwidth per handset suffers; too wide a spectrum slice, and there are deployment
issues for operators short on spectrum. This became a major issue with the US roll-out of UMTS
over W-CDMA, where W-CDMA's 5 MHz requirement often left no room in some markets for
operators to co-deploy it with existing GSM standards.

LTE supports both FDD and TDD mode. While FDD makes use of paired spectra for UL and DL
transmission separated by a duplex frequency gap, TDD is alternating using the same spectral
resources used for UL and DL, separated by guard time[13]. Each mode has its own frame
structure within LTE and these are aligned with each other meaning that similar hardware can be
used in the base stations and terminals to allow for economy of scale. The TDD mode in LTE is
aligned with TD-SCDMA as well allowing for coexistence. Ericsson demonstrated at the MWC
2008 in Barcelona for the first time in the world both LTE FDD and TDD mode on the same
base station platform.

[edit] Downlink

LTE uses OFDM for the downlink – that is, from the base station to the terminal. OFDM meets
the LTE requirement for spectrum flexibility and enables cost-efficient solutions for very wide
carriers with high peak rates. It is a well-established technology, for example in standards such
as IEEE 802.11a/g, 802.16, HIPERLAN-2, DVB and DAB.

In the time domain there is a radio frame that is 10 ms long and consists of 10 sub frames of 1 ms
each. Every sub frame consists of 2 slots where each slot is 0.5 ms. The subcarrier spacing in the
frequency domain is 15 kHz. Twelve of these subcarriers together (per slot) is called a resource
block so one resource block is 180 kHz. 6 Resource blocks fit in a carrier of 1.4 MHz and 100
resource blocks fit in a carrier of 20 MHz.

In the downlink there are three different physical channels. The Physical Downlink Shared
Channel (PDSCH) is used for all the data transmission, the Physical Multicast Channel (PMCH)
is used for broadcast transmission using a Single Frequency Network, and the Physical Broadcast
Channel (PBCH) is used to send most important system information within the cell[14]. Supported
modulation formats on the PDSCH are QPSK, 16QAM and 64QAM.
For MIMO operation, a distinction is made between single user MIMO, for enhancing one user's
data throughput, and multi user MIMO for enhancing the cell throughput.

[edit] Uplink

In the uplink, LTE uses a pre-coded version of OFDM called Single Carrier Frequency Division
Multiple Access (SC-FDMA). This is to compensate for a drawback with normal OFDM, which
has a very high peak-to-average power ratio (PAPR). High PAPR requires expensive and
inefficient power amplifiers with high requirements on linearity, which increases the cost of the
terminal and drains the battery faster. SC-FDMA solves this problem by grouping together the
resource blocks in a way that reduces the need for linearity, and so power consumption, in the
power amplifier. A low PAPR also improves coverage and the cell-edge performance.

In the uplink there are two physical channels. While the Physical Random Access Channel
(PRACH) is only used for initial access and when the UE is not uplink synchronized[15], all the
data is being send on the Physical Uplink Shared Channel (PUSCH). Supported modulation
formats on the uplink data channel are QPSK, 16QAM and 64QAM.

If virtual MIMO / Spatial division multiple access (SDMA) is introduced the data rate in the
uplink direction can be increased depending on the number of antennas at the base station. With
this technology more than one mobile can reuse the same resources.[16] l

[edit] Frequency bands and channel bandwidths

From Tables 5.5-1 "E-UTRA Operating Bands" and 5.6.1-1 "E-UTRA Channel Bandwidth" of
3GPP TS 36.101 (Release 8.4.0),[17] the following table lists the specified frequency bands of
LTE and the channel bandwidths each listed band supports:

Downlink
Uplink (UL)
(DL)
[hide]E- Operating
Operating
UTRA Band Duplex Channel
Band
Operating BS Receive Bandwidths
BS Transmit Alias Region(s)
UE Mode (MHz)
UE
Band Transmit
Receive

UMTS
1920 MHz to 2110 MHz to Japan, Europe,
I (1) FDD 5, 10, 15, 20 IMT,
1980 MHz 2170 MHz Asia
"2100"
1850 MHz to 1930 MHz to 1.4, 3, 5, 10, PCS, United States,
II (2) FDD
1910 MHz 1990 MHz 15, 20 "1900" Latin America
1710 MHz to 1805 MHz to 1.4, 3, 5, 10, DCS 1800, Finland,[18] Hong
III (3) FDD
1785 MHz 1880 MHz 15, 20 "1800" Kong[19][20]
 AWS,
1710 MHz to 2110 MHz to 1.4, 3, 5, 10, US, Latin
IV (4) FDD "1.7/2.1
1755 MHz 2155 MHz 15, 20 America
GHz"
Cellular
824 MHz to 869 MHz to
V (5) FDD 1.4, 3, 5, 10 850, US, Australia
849 MHz 894 MHz
UMTS850
830 MHz to 875 MHz to
VI (6) FDD 5, 10 UMTS800 Japan
840 MHz 885 MHz
2500 MHz to 2620 MHz to IMT-E,
VII (7) FDD 5, 10, 15, 20 EU
2570 MHz 2690 MHz "2.5 GHz"
GSM,
880 MHz to 925 MHz to EU, Latin
VIII (8) FDD 1.4, 3, 5, 10 UMTS900,
915 MHz 960 MHz America
EGSM900
1844.9 MHz
1749.9 MHz to
IX (9) to FDD 5, 10, 15, 20 UMTS1700 US, Japan
1784.9 MHz
1879.9 MHz
1710 MHz to 2110 MHz to UMTS,IMT Brazil, Uruguay,
X (10) FDD 5, 10, 15, 20
1770 MHz 2170 MHz 2000 Ecuador, Peru
1475.9 MHz Japan (Softbank,
1427.9 MHz to
XI (11) to FDD 5, 10, 15, 20 PDC KDDI,
1452.9 MHz
1500.9 MHz DoCoMo)[21]
698 MHz to 728 MHz to
XII (12) FDD 1.4, 3, 5, 10
716 MHz 746 MHz
Verizon's
777 MHz to 746 MHz to
XIII (13) FDD 1.4, 3, 5, 10 700 MHz
787 MHz 756 MHz
Block C
788 MHz to 758 MHz to 700 MHz
XIV (14) FDD 1.4, 3, 5, 10
798 MHz 768 MHz Block D
AT&T's
704 MHz to 734 MHz to
XVII (17) FDD 1.4, 3, 5, 10 700 MHz
716 MHz 746 MHz
Block B
XXXIII
1900 MHz to 1920 MHz TDD 5, 10, 15, 20
(33)
XXXIV
2010 MHz to 2025 MHz TDD 5, 10, 15
(34)
XXXV 1.4, 3, 5, 10,
1850 MHz to 1910 MHz TDD
(35) 15, 20
XXXVI 1.4, 3, 5, 10,
1930 MHz to 1990 MHz TDD
(36) 15, 20
XXXVII
1910 MHz to 1930 MHz TDD 5, 10, 15, 20
(37)
XXXVIII
2570 MHz to 2620 MHz TDD 5, 10 EU
(38)
XXXIX
1880 MHz to 1920 MHz TDD 5, 10, 15, 20
(39)
XL (40) 2300 MHz to 2400 MHz TDD 10, 15, 20 IMT-2000 China

[edit] LTE Device Testing Challenges

Two factors affect LTE test requirements: 1) the move from single-carrier to multi-carrier
OFDM modulated signals and 2) the transition from SISO (single-input single-output) to MIMO
signal stream transmissions.

OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) signals include multiple subcarriers

precisely aligned and occupying a wide channel bandwidth (up to 20 MHz). OFDM signals have
higher peak-to-average ratio (PAR) values than single-carrier signals, which increase the
likelihood of bit error rate as a result of transmitter power amplifier gain compression. Unlike
WiMAX, LTE compensates for this by using a different modulation scheme (SC-FDMA) for the
mobile device. Although it improves the power consumption of the amplifier, the baseband
processing becomes increasingly complex and ultimately more power hungry.

Emerging standards such as WiMAX, HSPA+, and LTE are all systems based in MIMO
(Multiple Input Multiple Output). Today’s MIMO systems should provide higher throughput or
greater coverage. The move from SISO to MIMO signal stream transmissions requires the use of
new measurement types, as well as test equipment capable of measuring multiple signal streams.
Because MIMO measurements are made of the composite multi-stream data channel and of the
individual signal streams, several new measurements are used to gauge the quality of the signal
and signal channel in MIMO systems, including channel response, the power of the individual
spatial streams of an N-by-M MIMO transmission, matrix condition, the ability of the receiver to
separate the multiple signal stream transmissions, as well as constellation diagrams. The
performance of a MIMO system depends on the behavior of the channel. The transmitter and
receiver must be tested using a multitude of channel models to ensure the design maintains
performance across a wide range of environments.

LTE Test Equipment. SISO measurements continue to be made on MIMO infrastructure and
user equipment. Some MIMO test equipment can make SISO measurements and is also scalable
to higher numbers of precisely synchronized MIMO channels for signal generation and signal
analysis. To make effective, accurate MIMO measurements, signal sources and analyzers must
be able to phase-align their local oscillators (ideally, less than a degree of phase error) and time-
align frequency references, D/A, and A/D sample rates — ideally, a nanosecond or less — to
minimize their contribution to the channel.

[edit] Technology Demos

• In September 2006, Siemens Networks (today Nokia Siemens Networks) showed in
collaboration with Nomor Research the first live emulation of a LTE network to the
media and investors. As live applications two users streaming an HD-TV video in the
downlink and playing an interactive game in the uplink have been demonstrated.[22]
• The first presentation of an LTE demonstrator with HDTV streaming (>30 Mbit/s), video
supervision and Mobile IP-based handover between the LTE radio demonstrator and the
commercially available HSDPA radio system was shown during the ITU trade fair in
Hong Kong in December 2006 by Siemens Communication Department.
• In February 2007, Ericsson demonstrated for the first time in the world LTE with bit rates
up to 144 Mbit/s[23]
• In September 2007, NTT docomo demonstrated LTE data rates of 200 Mbit/s with power
consumption below 100 mW during the test.[24]
• In November 2007, Infineon presented the world’s first RF transceiver named SMARTi®
LTE supporting LTE functionality in a single-chip RF silicon processed in CMOS [25][26]
• At the February 2008 Mobile World Congress:
o Huawei demonstrated Long Term Evolution ("LTE") applications by means of
multiplex HDTV services and mutual gaming that has transmission speeds of 100
Mbps.
o Motorola demonstrated how LTE can accelerate the delivery of personal media
experience with HD video demo streaming, HD video blogging, Online gaming
and VoIP over LTE running a RAN standard compliant LTE network & LTE
chipset.[27]
o Ericsson demonstrated the world’s first end-to-end LTE call on handheld[7]
Ericsson demonstrated LTE FDD and TDD mode on the same base station
platform.
o Freescale Semiconductor demonstrated streaming HD video with peak data rates
of 96 Mbit/s downlink and 86 Mbit/s uplink.[28]
o NXP Semiconductors demonstrated a multi-mode LTE modem as the basis for a
software-defined radio system for use in cellphones.[29]
o picoChip and Mimoon demonstrated a base station reference design. This runs on
a common hardware platform (multi-mode / software defined radio) with their
WiMAX architecture.[30]
• In April 2008, Motorola demonstrated the first EV-DO to LTE hand-off - handing over a
streaming video from LTE to a commercial EV-DO network and back to LTE.[31]
• In April 2008, LG Electronics and Nortel demonstrated LTE data rates of 50 Mbit/s while
travelling at 110 km/h.[32]
• In April 2008 Ericsson unveiled its M700 mobile platform, the world’s first
commercially available LTE-capable platform, with peak data rates of up to 100 Mbit/s in
the downlink and up to 50 Mbit/s in the uplink. The first products based on M700 will be
data devices such as laptop modems, Expresscards and USB modems for notebooks, as
well other small-form modems suitable for consumer electronic devices. Commercial
release is set for 2009, with products based on the platform expected in 2010.
• Researchers at Nokia Siemens Networks and Heinrich Hertz Institut have demonstrated
LTE with 100 Mbit/s Uplink transfer speeds.[16]
• At the February 2009 Mobile World Congress:
 o Huawei demonstrated the world' s first unified frequency-division duplex and
time-division duplex (FDD/TDD) long-term evolution (LTE) solution.
o Aricent gave a demonstration of LTE eNodeB layer2 stacks.
o Setcom Streaming a Video [33]
o Infineon demonstrated a single-chip 65 nm CMOS RF transceiver providing
2G/3G/LTE functionality[34]
• In May 2009 Setcom Streaming HD Video at GSMA MWC and LTE World Summit
• In August 2009, Nortel and LG Electronics demonstrated the first successful handoff
between CDMA and LTE networks in a standards-compliant manner [35]

[edit] Carrier adoption

Most carriers supporting GSM or HSUPA networks can be expected to upgrade their networks to
LTE at some stage:

• Rogers Wireless has stated that they intend on initially launching their LTE network in
Vancouver by February 2010, just in time for the Winter Olympics.[36]
• AT&T Mobility has stated that they intend on upgrading to LTE as their 4G technology
in 2011, but will introduce HSUPA and HSPA+ as bridge standards.[37]
• TeliaSonera has started network built up in Stockholm and Oslo, and will follow up in
Copenhagen when a license in Denmark has been bought/granted. The networks are still
only for testing. There are no indication of a public live date.
• In January 2009 TeliaSonera signed a contract for an LTE network with Huawei covering
Oslo, Norway. Under the agreement, Huawei will provide an end-to-end LTE solution
including LTE base stations, core network and OSS (Operating Support System).
• In January 2009 Ericsson and TeliaSonera announced the signing of a commercial LTE
network. The roll-out of the 4G mobile broadband network will offer the highest data
rates ever realized, with the best interactivity and quality. This network will cover
Sweden’s capital Stockholm and the contract is Ericsson’s first for commercial
deployment of LTE.
• T-Mobile, Vodafone, France Télécom and Telecom Italia Mobile have also announced or
talked publicly about their commitment to LTE.
• In August 2009 Telefónica selected six countries to field-test LTE in the succeeding
months: Spain, the United Kingdom, Germany and the Czech Republic in Europe, and
Brazil and Argentina in Latin America.[38]

Despite initial development of the rival UMB standard, which was designed as an upgrade path
for CDMA networks, most operators of networks based upon the latter system have also
announced their intent to migrate to LTE, resulting in discontinuation of UMB development.

• Verizon Wireless completed its first test LTE data calls in August 2009 and plans to
deploy LTE beginning in 2010 with system-wide deployment completed in 2013.[39]
• Bell Mobility has stated their intention to use LTE as a future upgrade to their
forthcoming HSDPA network.[40]
• Telus Mobility has announced that it will adopt LTE as its 4G wireless standard.[41]
• MetroPCS recently announced that it would be using LTE for its upcoming 4G network.
[42]

• The newly formed China Telecom/China Unicom[43] and Japan's KDDI[44] have
announced they have chosen LTE as their 4G network technology.
• Cox Communications has its first tower for wireless LTE network build-out.[citation needed]
Wireless services should launch late 2009.
• AlMadar Aljadeed the biggest Libyan Mobile Phone operator has announced adopting
the LTE technology passing straight from 2G Technology to 4G. With this, Libya will be
the first country in Africa and one of the premieres in the World to adopt such advanced
technology for its national users.[45]
• The Dutch telecom provider KPN announced that it will use LTE for its 4G network.[46]
• The Irish telco Digiweb is currently operating a 4G service in the Dublin area.