Standards
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Standards
3GPP is the standards organization that is responsible for the evolutionary planning of the GSM family of technologies. 3GPP creates specifications for wireless cellular technologies through working groups comprised of operators and vendors to further the development and standardization for successful global deployments of the GSM family of technologies and labels the final stages of development as “releases.” 3GPP uses a system of parallel releases to provide developers with a stable platform for implementation and to allow for the addition of new features required by the market.
 UMTS Release-99 (Rel-99) specifications, initially standardized in early- to mid-1999 and published by 3GPP in March 2000, provided the 3G evolutionary path for GSM, GPRS and EDGE technologies, enabling more spectrally efficient and better performing voice and data services through the introduction of a 5 MHz UMTS carrier. The next step was Rel-4 which was completed in March 2001, Rel-5 was published in March 2002 and Rel-6 was completed in March 2005. These 3G technology standards were fully commercialized following the first launch of 3G UMTS (FOMA) services by NTT DoCoMo in Japan in 2001, with 2003 as the year when Rel-99 UMTS networks were more widely commercialized. The number of commercial 3G networks as of March 2009 – with UMTS or HSPA – number more than 280 commercial networks with another 50 already planned for deployment. In 1Q 2009, the UMTS-HSPA standard is available worldwide for use in the 850, 900, 1700, 1800, 1900, 2000, 2100, and 1700/2100 MHz bands and will also support future frequency bands including 700, 2500 and 2600 MHz as well as the 1500 MHz band in Japan and the 2300 MHz in the U.S.
 Rel-4 introduced call and bearer separation in the Core Network, and Rel-5 introduced some significant enhancements to UMTS including HSDPA, IMS and IP UTRAN. Rel-6 introduced further enhancements to UMTS including HSUPA (or E-DCH), MBMS, and Advanced Receivers.
Rel-7 standards were finalized in mid-2007 and Rel-8 standards were published in March 2009. Vendors are proceeding well in developing the commercial introduction of Rel-7/HSPA+. As an example, Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) antenna techniques were developed by vendors as well as flat-IP base stations, an innovation that integrates key components of 3G mobile networks into a single network element optimized to support UMTS-HSPA data services, and “flattens” what is typically a more complex architecture.
Rel-7 features have been commercially introduced as HSPA+. HSPA+ trials began in 3Q 2007 and commercial networks were in the market by the 1Q 2009 in Australia, Austria, Hong Kong, and Singapore and many operators have announced plans to deploy HSPA+ in 2009 including AT&T in the U.S. HSPA+ mobile broadband initially supports peak rates of 21 Mbps downlink on commercial networks deployed in 1Q 2009.
Based on Rel-7, Downlink Dual Carrier EDGE doubles data speeds to 592 Kbps compared to current EDGE network data speeds. Product is expected in the market by end of 2009. A further update called EGPRS 2B will provide downlink speeds of up to 1.2 Mbps and uplink up to 473 Kbps, quadrupling the current capabilities of EDGE. Typically called EDGE evolved or Evolved EDGE, this simple upgrade of existing infrastructure will significantly improve latency, coverage and spectrum efficiency of existing GSM/EDGE equipment.
3GPP Rel-8 specifications include enhancements to HSPA+ technology as well as the introduction of Evolved Packet Core (EPC) which consists of a flat-IP based all-packet core (System Architecture Evolution/SAE or EPC) coupled with a new Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing Access or OFDMA-based Radio Access Network (RAN) or Evolved Universal Terrestrial RAN (EUTRAN)/Long Term Evolution (LTE). Improvements to downlink speeds support data rates up to 42 Mbps, using either a combination of 2X2 MIMO antenna technology and 64 QAM (Quadrature Amplitude Modulation) or dual-carrier HSDPA for operation on two 5 MHz carriers with 64 QAM. Dual-carrier doubles the peak rate from 21 Mbps to 42 Mbps without the use of MIMO. Telstra announced commercial deployment of HSPA+ at 42 Mbps by the end of 2009.
The 3G Americas white paper, The Mobile Broadband Evolution: 3GPP Release 8 and Beyond HSPA+, SAE/LTE and LTE-Advanced, provides detailed discussions on the HSPA+ enhancements in Rel-8 as well as the EPS, EPC and LTE architecture, features/capabilities and performance estimates. It also addresses 3GPP planning for Rel-9 and Rel-10 content.
In addition to further enhancements to HSPA+, Rel-9 will be focused on features that enhance Rel-8 EPC/LTE capabilities in areas such as location, emergency and broadcast services, support of Circuit Switched (CS) over LTE, Home NodeB/eNodeB architecture considerations (i.e. support for femtocell- type applications) and IMS evolution. Rel-10 will address the evolution of the LTE technology to meet IMT-Advanced requirements (called LTE-Advanced) at the same time that work is commencing on Rel-9. 3GPP recognizes the need to develop a solution and specification to be submitted to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) for meeting the IMT-Advanced requirements, and therefore, in parallel with Rel-9 work, 3GPP is working on the LTE-Advanced study item.
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