28 Feb 2012

Multiple Interconnected Small Base Stations Solve High Density Issues

Nokia Siemens Networks, NSN have been providing details of their small cell solutions designed to meet the needs of increased capacity and performance fo cellular networks.

It is a well known fact that improvements in radio access network technology such as OFDM used for LTE, will not on their own provide the increased capacity required for the “data explosion” that is occurring. Most of this will be provided by the reduction in cell sizes and by more intelligent use of small cell technology.

In a release from NSN they detail a solution that they have developed to deliver mobile broadband across areas with a very high user density and level of efficiency. Multiple, locally managed access points are used to create a network of interconnected ‘small cells’* creating a ‘Flexi Zone’ of mobile broadband coverage with a single connection back to an operator’s network. The Flexi Zones technique allows for virtually unlimited scaling of capacity as each zone can have up to 100 access points and yet behave, from the network point of view, as a single base station.

The technology builds on Nokia Siemens Networks’ Liquid Radio architecture. The Flexi Zone is aimed at areas of high density usage, such as business campuses, shopping malls, or sports stadia. Flexi Zone can also reduce the cost per bit for operators, stated by NSN to be by more than 50% compared to adding capacity through additional, larger, macro sites.

The NSN Flexi Zone comprises multiple, inter-connected low-power small cells that use a common pool of resources managed flexibly by a zone controller. These clusters of HSPA, LTE and WiFi access points complement the macro-cellular network to deliver the best coverage and capacity where and when required. Flexi Zone allows local offloading of Internet traffic, saving up to 80% of transport and mobile packet core costs.

With its compact and highly integrated access points, Flexi Zone redefines how small cells are deployed. Based on the new architecture, each cluster of cells requires only one traditional connection to the network. Within the cluster, operators can benefit from more flexible ‘street level’ wireless connections (for instance WiFi, LTE).

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