Datang Wireless Mobile Innovation Center

December, 2013

Evolution, Convergence, and

Innovation

5G white paper

Content

Abstract

1. Introduction

2. What is 5G ?

3. Visions and requirements of 5G

4. Challenges and trends of 5G

5. Technology routes toward 5G

6. Summary

Reference

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Acronym 13

创 新

Abstract

The fast development of wireless mobile communication technologies in recent years started

an era of highly-effiencient information society. It is expected that the penetration of

wireless communication technologies will become wider and deeper in the coming years.

The ever diversifying applications enabled by wireless communication systems will touch

every aspects of people’s daily life. Realizing the greater importance of wireless

communication systems in the future, both academies and industries around the world have

initiated the study of the next generation, namely 5G, of wireless communication systems. In

this white paper, our views on 5G are shared, including visions and requirements, challenges

and trends, technology routes and potential technologies. Evolution, convergence and

innovation are considered the technology routes toward 5G.

Key Words: IMT, 5G, Vision and Requirement, Technology Route, Evolution,

Convergence, Innovation, IMT-Advanced, IMT-2020

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1. Introduction

Availability and exchange of rich information in today’s society leads to high requirements on the informtion

communication technology (ICT). It is fair to say that the value of ICT has gone far beyond the

communication itself, and is becoming the artery to sustain the information flush for the well being of the

society. Wireless mobile communication systems have been widely used due to its convenient connectivity. In

the future, wireless communication will be extended to applications beyond human-to-human communication,

and hence will play an even more important role. Observing the increasing demands of information society by

2020 and beyond, greater challenges are expected on the next generation (i.e. 5G) of the mobile

communication system from the aspects of spectrum, techniques and operation. Subsequently, research on the

5G has started all over the globe.

2. What is 5G？

The mobile communication system has evolved through the first generation (1G) to the fourth generation

(4G), with typical services and representative technologies for each generation. For example, 1G is analog

cellular system, while the second generation (2G) is digital system based on TDMA or FDMA. Both 1G and

2G are mainly designed for circuit switched voice application. The third generation (3G) is characterized by

CDMA and designed for packet switched services including multi-media. OFDM and MIMO are the key

technologies of 4G which supports wideband data and mobile internet services. Recently, with the fast

development of the integrated circuit (IC) technology, powerful cellular networks and terminals already exist.

Various wireless communication technolgies are converging to provide all types of exciting new services. It is

forseen that the future 5G cannot be defined by a single type of service or technology.

The 5G wireless communication system will be a converged system with multiple radio access technologies

integrated together. It can support a wide range of applications and services to comprehensively satistfy the

requirements of the information society by the year 2020 and beyond. From the technology perspective, 5G

will be the continuous enhancement and evolution of the present radio access technologies, and also the

development of novel radio access technologies to meet the increasing demand of future. 5G can be

characterized as data, connectivity and user experience.

Fig.1 Service development from 1G to 5G

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1G(1980’s)

Voice 2G(1990’s)

Voice&Text 3G(2000’s)

Multimedia

5G(2020’s)

Data,Connectivity,

and User Experience

4G(2010’s)

Mobile

Internet

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3. Visions and requirements of 5G

In January 2012 ITU approved the first release of the 4G global core standard (GCS)[1]. After the world radio

communication conferences 2012 (WRC-12), telecommunication industry began to discuss the visions and

requirements of 5G.

This section provides our views on the 5G vision from several perspectives, including social perspective,

user’s perspective and operator’s perspective. Based on the visions, key requirements of 5G are also proposed.

3.1 The 5G vision from social responsibilities and functions

Mobile communication systems have been playing an important role in our life for more than 20 years, and it

will enter even more dimensions of the society due to technology improvement. 5G is expected to play even a

larger role in the year 2020 and beyond, and its social responsibilities and functions can be summarized as

following four aspects.

● Wireless information circulation system of human ecosystems

IMT systems will positively influence many aspects of the future society, including tackling global warming,

narrowing the digital division, and reducing enviromental pollution, etc. In addition, IMT can also help in the

areas of public safety, medical and health, education, intelligent transportation system, smart grid, intelligent

city, logistics, agriculture, finance, etc.

IMT-enabled smart phone, mobile internet and new types of consumer electronic products will greatly affect

many industries such as entertainment, media, publication, advertisement. Especially, the e-commerce based

on desktop and mobile internet will reshape the retail industry.

In other words, IMT will be the wireless information circulation system of human ecosystems to keep the

whole society running smoothly and efficiently, and reliance on IMT in future society is expected to increase

to an unprecedented level.

● Ubiquitous Connectivity

IMT will extend beyond the conventional human-to-human communication and become the channel to

connect things in the world. With this channel, the world will be a very intelligent and highly efficient society

with the benifit of unlimited information exchange. Future IMT can extend people’s reach to everywhere in

the world and connect anyone and anything immediately.

Internet of Things (IoT) or device connection is the key characteristic of the information society in 2020. IMT

will be instrumental in the information society of IoT due to its advantages such as good system performance,

convenient connectivity, wider applicability and so on.

● Information centre of people’s life

Since its birth, the most important function of mobile phone is to provide a means for human-to-human

communication. For future mobile phone, its functions will expand to many other aspects of people’s daily

life, such as entertaiment, work, travel, shopping, m-wallet, m-banking, medicine, m-health, transportation,

smart home, etc.

In 2020 and beyond, smart mobile terminal will become the information centre of people’s daily life.

● Infrastructure for variety of fundamental communication services

With the development of mobile communication technologies and its extensive applications, the importance

and the value of communication to the society are much higher than the communication itself. In the future,

mobile communication will not be a luxury service as it was in early days. It will rather become an

infrastructure to provide people with variety of fundamental communication services just as the infrastructure

for water and electricity supplies. Of course, as a commercial system, mobile communication system shall

provide more high value added services which is also the key driving force of the 5G technology.

3.2 The 5G vision from User’s perspective

From consumer’s point of view, the 1G and 2G systems provide basic speech and short message services

(SMS), while the 3G and 4G systems provide rich multi-media services (MMS) and also wideband

experiences. In the era of 5G, mobile system will enhance user’s experience in many aspects such as: higher

demand, good performance, easy to use, affordable, safety and reliability, and personalization.

● Higher demand

Mobile phone/device becomes inseparable part of people’s daily life; people rely on it not only for simple

communication but also for entertainment. The 5G system should meet users’ higher demand of data rate and

capacity; some new services like full-HD video are predicted to be popular on the smart phone, which requires

data rate of 10Mbps or more in high mobility scenario. Moreover, 5G should provide users with as high as

100Mbps data rate to support services like ultra high definition TV (UHDTV); in special scenarios such as

immidiate downloading of big files, interactive 3D video conference, data rate higher than 10Gbps can also be

expected.

It is estimated by a study that future mobile data consumption will be on average 1Gbytes per day per user in

2020 and beyond.

Fig.2 The 5G vision from social responsibilities and functions

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Infrastructure

Ubiquitous Connectivity

Information Centre

Industry Connection Unlimited Communication Engine

Right of Communication

Exciting Wireless Life

Wirelesss Information Circulation System of Human Ecosystems

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● Good performance

Pervasive coverage and reliable performance are fundamental requirements of mobile communication.

Although existing cellular networks can cover 98% of human population, there are still coverage blind spots

for land mobile systems such as in mountains, oceans, polar region, aircrafts, etc. Also in some scenarios the

QoS is not stable, such as on high-speed railway, tunnels, subways, etc. Therefore, the future IMT should

provide good coverage and reliable QoS everywhere including those special scenarios.

The battery life of mobile terminal is another key aspect needing further enhancement. The expectation that

the battery life of the smart phone will improve 3-5 times longer than current ones is the minimum.

● Easy to use

5G will be a very sophisticated system with multi-modes, multi-bands and multi-RATs, but user will feel

much easier to use it.

Access technonologies are transparent to end users, multi-mode/multi-band mobile terminals can support

seamless handover among all kinds of RATs without user awareness and services can also seamlessly

handover among different terminals.

Many devices serving one user can be simply connected with each other, and simple mobile terminal

interfaces and applications make them suitable for all age groups.

Integrated subscription of different services enables a single contract for the user with unified billing.

● Affordable

Cost per bit will reduce to a very low level to support x1000 traffic explosion so that for the user the cost of

subscription will be similar or even less than today.

Another important aspect is lower global roaming cost when accessing data traffic from anywhere; people

expect to connect to internet freely around the world.

Apart from various affordable services, IMT has social responsibility to provide the basic communication

services in the community and free services to connect every one.

● Safety and Reliability

When mobile terminals become the centre of people’s life, higher level of security in communication system

is a must. In the case when mobile terminal becomes people’s social identity or replaces bank credit cards,

requirements on security and safety of future mobile systems and terminals will be very high. To win users’

trust and make sure they can fully rely on mobile communication, personal information and individal privacy

should be protected.

On the other hand, safety of using mobile terminal for prolonged period should be ensured that people’s health

is not compromised by further reducing the emission power.

● Personalization

The future IMT should provide user-centric services; users can customize subscription of services and add/

remove subscriptions at his/her own will at anytime.

Variable mobile terminals and personalized services will attract specific users from different age groups, areas

and regions. New types of wearable terminals such as glasses, watches and imbedded devices will be part of

people’s everyday life providing convient and free connection to wide range of services.

Besides public users, enterprise users’ specific requirements can also be fulfilled through the 5G public mobile

network.

3.3 The 5G vision from Operator’s perspective

For an operator, diversified applications and sustained revenue growth are the key points of interest in the 5G

network. Following aspects are important for sustainable growth.

● Sufficient bandwidth and capacity

Sufficient bandwidth should be available for 5G network and should have capacity to meet the requirements

of high average and peak data rates in affordable cost.

In the meantime, as predicted by many organizations, mobile operators should deploy the network to support

more than x1000 data traffic volume in 2020 than today.

Moreover, 5G network should support more connected devices coming from the wide usage of the Internet of

Things, reaching x10-x100 mobile subscribers of today.

● Low cost and easy to deploy

An user would expect the similar cost as today for x1000 of data volume per monthly subscription, this

requires the cost per bit to lower down to 1/1000 of today’s level.

Energy saving is also very important for future IMT, x1000 traffic without increase in energy cosumption is

another key requirement of 5G.

5G will be a multi-layered, multi-RAT heterogeneous network including 2G, 3G, LTE and future radio

interface technologies (RITs). And, it may also converge many other radio technologies like mobile satellite

system (MSS), digital video broadcasting (DVB), wireless local access network (WLAN), wireless personal

access network (WPAN), etc., with multi-tiers coverage by macro, pico, femto, relay and other types of small

cells. For such a sophisticated 5G network, it should be easy to deploy and simple to operate in order to

decrease CAPEX and OPEX.

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Broad User Category

-Private

-Groups

-Professional User

-Everything

High Quality MBB

Experience

-High Performance

-High Reliability

-Long Battery

-Security and Credibility

Exciting Mobile Life

-Unlimited Communication

-Plentiful Entertainment

-Convenient Working and Life

-Touch Everywhere by Wireless

Fig.3 User’s perspective

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● Service diversification and increasing revenue

The future 5G system should support diverse services and be flexible to operate; wide range of services and

application scenarios including M2M, D2D, PPDR and also other industrial use cases are expected to grow.

The 5G mobile network will be an open service platform to bear all kinds of mobile internet applications and

it supports more flexible operation model to enable both network operators and service providers to generate

their own revenue.

● Backward compatibility and investment protection

The future 5G network should be backward compatible with current network and RATs for protection of

investment; 2G, 3G, 4G and future RATs shall interwork with one another as single integrated network.

3.4 Technical requirments of the 5G

Based on above analysis of the 5G vision from several perspective, preliminary technical requirements of the

5G are given below:

--x1000 mobile data traffic compared to current traffic volume, for example, more than 100Gbps/km2

throughput,

--x100 connections, for example, more than 1million connections/km2,

--10Gbps peak data rate,

--above 10Mbps affordable per user data rate anywhere and anytime, and 100Mbps for some special

users,

--lower latency, delay in milliseconds (ms) for end-to-end user plane, and within 10ms for control plane,

--higher spectrum efficiency, 3-5 times higher than today for large area coverage and even higher for

special cases,

--lower cost, nearly 1/1000 of cost per bit than today,

--higher energy efficiency, nearly 1/1000 of energy consumption per bit than today.

Fig.4 Key capabilities of 5G

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4. Challenges and trends of 5G

Looking back into the development of mobile communication hitherto, to meet the requirements of 5G,

development of 5G faces challenges from perspectives of spectrum, technology and operation.

4.1 Challenges on spectrum

In order to meet the development requirements of mobile communication market in 2020 and beyond, more

spectrum bands allocation is needed. From estimation and forecast of spectrum demand in ITU-R

approximately 1490 to 1810MHz bandwidth is needed, compared to the currently allocated hundreds of MHz

in each country around 1GHz bandwidth need to be additionally allocated.

Spectrum resource is scarce; however, the market requirement is increasing. Dedicated spectrum allocation is

causing low spectrum utilization thus leading to waste, flexible utilization of spectrum should be studied and

supported by related policies.

4.2 Challenges on technology

● Convergence of multiple systems

Following the rapid development of integrated circuit (IC) technology and smart terminals, there is a trend of

integrating applicaitons and functions into a smart electronic equipment. For example, traditional mobile

phone is replaced by powerful smart phone, which has both the functions of PC and phone. Also, new flat

panel display/TV, digital camera and other consumer electronics (CEs) are evolving as smart digital

equipments, embedded with 3G/4G mobile communication module, enhanced CPUs and smart operation

system (OS). Multiple networks, such as digital broadcasting network, fixed broadband network, wireless

broadband network, terrestrial and satellite mobile communication networks, will be converged to support

variety of applications to multi-mode terminals. 5G network will be multi-services, multi-bands, multi-RATs

and multi-layers integrated technology. How to converge the systems to provide best user experiences,

maximize the spectrum efficiency, and generate long-term profits is a big challenge.

● Increase of capacity and spectrum efficiency

The 5G objectives such as x1000 current mobile data traffic, x100 current connected devices, 10Mbps -

100Mbps user data rate experience anywhere and anytime and etc, need to be met with limited frequency

bandwidth. Besides, increasing frequency allocation and spectrum efficiency, considering more popular

scenarios of indoor and hotspot for future data traffic, ultra dense network tends to be one of the most

promising technical solutions, however, interference coordination and network planning and optimization will

be challenging.

● Support of IoT (Internet of Things) and flexible services

With IMT applications penetrating into diverse industries and ever increasing popularity of IoT, service

variety and flexibility of IMT also increases rapidly. From perspective of data rate, 5G efficiently supports

smart metering service, where a small packet (tens of bits) is transmitted in several days or even longer period

of time, and also the interactive 3D holographic video service where the data rate will be in the range of Gbps.

From perspective of latency, 5G supports both services which are not sensitive to packet delay, e.g.

background downloading, and services which require very low end-to-end latency, e.g. real-time industrial

controlling, need to be supported. From perspective of mobility, high QoS services are to be supported in the

scenarios of ultra high-speed. The challenge is to support wide range of services, scenarios and use cases in a

single standardized system.

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● Reduction of energy consumption and cost in network

Supporting x1000 traffic with similar energy consumption and cost is another challenge of 5G. It needs to

further consider optimization and/or redesigning of network structure, air interface, routing and switching,

content distribution and etc.

● Enhancement of terminal devices

In future, the wireless network will be ubiquitously available, mobile terminal is expected to support 5-10

modes. For example, China Mobile custom 4G smart phones have supported TD-LTE, FDD-LTE, TD-

SCDMA, WCDMA, GSM, and WiFi, infrared, Bluetooth, FM radio etc. Keeping the cost lower and extending

the battery life will bring huge challenge to chipset manufacturing technolgy, RF design, battery technology

and etc.

● Support of new mobile broadband industry eco-system

It is expected that application and service will be center of the future mobile broadband network. Current

cellular network operation and management model of the system may not be suitable for the new emerging

business model. Principles of virtual operation and software defined network (SDN) are redefining the

transmission network architecture; adaptation to the requirements of new eco-system in future is an important

aspect.

4.3 Challenges on operation

Although, rapid increase in mobile data traffic volume in the recent years, operators’ overall revenue growth is

saturating. It is important for operators to pursue new and reasonable profit model in mobile broadband

industry eco-system. With emergence of new operation model, such as virtual operation and joint operation, to

better support new service and application in future, traditional network operators and new service operators

are expected to have a further cooperation. Furthermore, in future, management and control model of the

network will have to meet various demands from network operators, service operators, public safety

departments and also users’ security and privacy.

4.4 Trends

Considering the challenges above, the industry is expected:

-- to keep on optimizing and evolving the 4G system, to get better user experience, higher spectrum

efficiency and support new services,

-- to converge all the radio technologies and mobile communication systems, ultilizing all the spectrum

bands flexibly to provide the best user experience with the lowest cost,

-- and, to drive technology innovation to upgrade current system to a very high efficientand low cost system.

5. Technology routes toward 5G

Evolution, convergence and innovation are considered the three technology routes toward 5G.

5.1 Evolution

Phasing out of one generation of technology normally takes long period of time. After more than 20 years

commercialization from its initial launch globaly the number of 2G mobile subscribers is about 58.6% of total

subscribers in 2012. After 10 years’ development, 3G subscribers are now increasing very fast and are

expected to exceed that of 2G in 2013. With about 5 years’ development, the number of LTE subscribers has

broken through 100 million in 2013. It is expected that LTE and its evolution will dominate mobile system in

year 2020. Evolution is the most important technology route of 5G, which includes:

● Enhancement of LTE-Hi[2][3]/Small-Cell

Ultra dense networking is the most efficient way to meet increase of data traffic in future. LTE-Hi,

proposed by China, mainly tragets scenarios of high frequency, hotspot and small coverage, to

provide broadband mobile data service over TDD system.

● Advanced antenna technology, e.g. 3D-Beamforming and Massive MIMO.

Based on AAS technology, arrays with large numbers of antennas placed on 2D plane are possible

to be deployed in future radio access networks. The extension in antenna array dimension offers the

flexibility in UE-specific spatial pre-processing in both horizontal and vertical domains to further

increase air interface spectrum efficiency.

● Cell edge performance enhancment, e.g. CoMP enhancement and advanced Interference

Cancellation.

● Support of more use cases and scenarios such as M2M, D2D, PPDR and other industry uses.

● Flexible and Reliable Network, e.g. Mobile relay, UE relay, and mobile ad-hoc network.

Based on traditional cellular cells, LTE needs to support more flexible network architecture and

multi-hops transmission such as mobile relay, UE relay or mobile ad-hoc, which provides multiple

services of good quality to users on high speed vehicles.

● Intelligent network and Smart Radio, e.g. Multi-RATs with single SON (self organization network),

Congnitive Network.

5.2 Convergence

5G features multi-fields, multi-services/systems, and multi-RATs/bands/layers/links:

● Multi-fields convergence

With improvement of computing capability, convergence of communication, information and

consumer electronics via internet becomes development trends. That further drives various service

systems and convergence of access techniques which provides a platform for new applications.

● Multi-services/systems convergence

It includes the convergence of DVB, Satellite, BWA and IMT. The key point of this convergence

lies in that each system should not only play its own important role but also cooperate with other

systems. By this way, the converged system can achieve the highest system efficiency and the best

user experience.

● Multi-RATs/Bands/Layers/Links convergence

It includes tight coupling of multiple radio access techniques, e.g. 2G/3G/4G/5G, multiple layers

coverage, e.g. Macro/Micro/Pico/Femto, and multiple links connection, e.g. Relay, D2D and UE-

Relay.

Main research fields in this type of convergence include:

-- RAT selection and service switching,

-- Service allocation among different RATs,

-- User plane/Control plane splitting,

-- Joint RRM,

-- SON, etc.

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5.3 Innovation

In order to meet long-term demand, breakthrough technologies are also vital parts of 5G. Novel wireless

transmission technolgies, spectrum ultilization technologies, and network structures will gradually mature and

develop in coming years. Technical innovations are possible in following directions:

● New spectum ultilization, including CRS and very high spectrum (mmWave).

Fully static spectrum usage strategy cannot make efficient usage of allocated spectrum for certain

service due to dynamic change of network load. Experiences show that in time, space, and/or

frequency domain, there are unused radio resources, i.e. so-called spectrum holes. Flexible spectrum

usage can improve the frequency efficiency by spectrum sharing and making use of spectrum holes.

● Novel air interface transmission, e.g. Full-Duplex, non-orthoganal multiplexing, OAM.

Non-orthogonal access technique employing the interference cancelation (IC) receiver[4] achieves

higher spectral efficiency. The progress on nonlinear detection techniques and semi-conductor

technology has made the IC-receivers a promising technology for future IMT systems.

● New network structure, C-RAN, radio network structure based on the concept of software defined

network (SDN) and content delivery network (CDN).

Fig.5 Technology routes toward 5G

Convergence

Evolution

Innovation

5G

6. Summary

5G is a multi-system, multi-technolgy converged network, which will support wide range of services and meet

the requirements of information society in 2020 and beyond. Better user experience and sustainable profit for

operator are the main targets to develop 5G, and the capability of 5G will be greatly increased from user’s

perspective and operator’s perspective.

Evolution, Convergence and Innovation are considered the technology routes toward 5G.

From TD-SCDMA to TD-LTE-Advanced and then to the coming 5G, Datang Telecommunication Group has

been concentrating on the innovation and development of mobile communication, pushing the informationize

progress of human society. Datang is willing to cooperate with international partners in an open manner to

develop 5G successfully.

Reference

[1]Recommendation ITU-R M.2012(01/2012), “Detailed specifications of the terrestrial radio interfaces of

International Mobile Telecommunications Advanced(IMT-Advanced)”, 2012.

[2]Shanzhi Chen, Yingmin Wang, Weiguo Ma, Jun Chen, “Technical innovations promoting standard

evolution : from TD-SCDMA to TD-LTE and beyond”, IEEE wireless communications, Vol.19, Issue 2, p60-

66, February 2012.

[3]Shaoli Kang, Yingmin Wang, Fei Qin, Li Chen, “LTE-Hi: evolution toward next generation mobile

broadband network”, invited paper at WWRF#29, Berlin, October 2012.

[4]Xiaoming Dai, Shaohui Sun, Yingmin Wang, “Successive interference cancellation amiable space-time

codes with good multiplexing-diversity tradeoff”, 15th Asia-Pacific Conference Oct. 2009,pp. 237-240.

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Acronym Full Name

1G first generation mobile communication system

2G second generation mobile communication system

3G third generation mobile communication system

3GPP Third Generation Partnership Project

4G forth generation mobile communication system

5G fifth generation mobile communication system

AAS Active Antenna System

BWA Broadband Wireless Access

CAPEX Capital Expenditure

CDMA Code Division Multiple Access

CDN Content Delivery Network

CEs Consumer Electronics

CoMP Coordination of Multiple Points

C-RAN Cloud Radio Access Network

CRS Cognitive Radio System

D2D Device to Device

DVB Digital Video Broadcasting

FDD-LTE Frequency Division Duplex Long Term Evolution

FDMA Frequency Division Multiple Access

Full-HD Full High Definition

GSM Global System for Mobile communication

IMT International Mobile Telecommunications

IMT-2020 International Mobile Telecommunications for 2020

IMT-A International Mobile Telecommunications Advanced

ITU-R International Telecommunication Union Radio

LTE-Hi Long Term Evolution for Hotspot and Indoor

M2M Machine to Machine

MAC Medium Access Control

MBB Mobile Broadband

MIMO Multiple Input Multiple Output

MSS Mobile Satellite System

OAM Orbital Angular Momentum

OFDM Othogonal Frequency Division Mulplexing

OPEX Operating Expense

PPDR Public Protection and Disaster Relief

RAT Radio Access Technology

RF Radio Frequency

RIT Radio Interface Technology

RRM Radio Resource Management

SDN Software Defined Network

SDR Software Defined Radio

SON Self Organization Network

TD-LTE Time Division Duplex Long Term Evolution

TDMA Time Division Multiple Access

TD-SCDMA Time Division Synchronisation Code Division Multiple Access

UHDTV Ultra High Definition Television

WCDMA Wideband Code Division Multiple Access

WiFi Wireless Fidelity

WLAN Wireless Local Acess Network

WPAN Wireless Personal Acess Network

Acronym

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