3GPP Mobile Broadband September 2014
www.4gamericas.org
3GPP technologies - HSPA, HSPA+, LTE and now LTE-Advanced - are the foundation of
the mobile broadband world, providing customers with seamless and fast connections
worldwide.
HSPA and LTE build on the 3GPP ecosystem of more than 800 service providers, in more than
200 countries worldwide, with over 6.5 billion subscriptions, delivering tremendous economies of
scope and scale
HSPA will continue to be the leading mobile broadband technology through the end of the decade
providing a global footprint, international roaming and robust mobile broadband speeds
HSPA+, a simple upgrade to the HSPA networks today, protects and enhances an operator’s
infrastructure investment; more than half of all 556 HSPA operators have upgraded to HSPA+
3GPP GLOBAL FOOTPRINT & INTERNATIONAL ROAMING1
Commercial
Networks Countries
Anticipated
Launches
June 2014
Subscriptions
Forecast
YE2014
Subscriptions
HSPA 556 203 100 1.6 Billion 1.7 Billion
HSPA+ 365 157
LTE 323 111 200+ 281 Million 386 Million
LTE-Advanced 20 15 N/A
3GPP Mobile Broadband HSPA and LTE 1.9 Billion 2.1 Billion
By the end of 2019, the global mobile broadband market is expected to include more than 6.7
billion subscribers, with 6.4 billion using 3GPP technologies, representing 95% market share2
1 Data as of 2 September 2014.
2 Source: Ovum, WCIS, June 2014 Subscriber Forecast.
www.4gamericas.org
2
LTE has exploded into existence as one of the most powerful wireless technologies ever
developed.
More than 500 operators, including leading GSM-HSPA and CDMA EV-DO operators and newly
licensed operators, are making strategic, long-term commitments to LTE networks; WiMAX
operators have a smooth path to LTE-TDD—all roads lead to LTE
More than 280 million LTE connections forecast to reach 2.3 billion in 2019, not including M2M
More than 1,189 LTE devices from over 168 manufacturers have been launched with 99% of LTE
devices operating on either HSPA, HSPA+ or DC-HSPA+ networks3
LTE (Rel-8) will offer typical user downlink speeds of 5 Mbps to 12 Mbps (in 2X10 MHz) and
typical uplink speeds of 2 Mbps to 5 Mbps
Wider channels of spectrum result in faster throughput. LTE’s peak theoretical downlink
throughput rates are 300 Mbps in 20 MHz bandwidth channels with 4X4 MIMO and 71 Mbps
uplink in 20 MHz
LTE, an all-IP-based technology, has the highest spectral efficiency of any mobile broadband
standard and delivers a seamless broadband experience for the consumer in both the fixed and
mobile world. LTE is designed to support voice in the packet domain with VoLTE. Other features:
o Scalability to operate in bandwidths from 1.4 MHz to 20 MHz
o Operability in both TDD and FDD modes
o Reduced latency to 10 milliseconds round-trip time between user equipment and the
base station, and to less than 100 milliseconds transition time from inactive to active
LTE has significant economic advantages over other wireless technologies: it builds upon the
economies of scale and scope of the entire 3GPP family of technologies; LTE’s flat IP
architecture leads to a lower deployment cost-per-megabyte, better spectrum management and
efficient scalability
EVOLUTION OF 3GPP TECHNOLOGIES4
3 GSA, July 2014.
4 Beyond LTE: Enabling the Mobile Broadband Expansion: Rysavy Research for 4G Americas, August 2014.
www.4gamericas.org
3
LTE offers a continuing evolution of technology that will lead to LTE-Advanced
LTE-Advanced, in 3GPP Release 10, will bring new technology enhancements to increase
network performance, speed and utilization of spectral resources. LTE-Advanced includes a
variety of techniques that may be deployed individually or in partnership with each other
depending on an operator’s strategy and network
o Faster throughput is largely achieved by combining carriers (frequencies) through Carrier
Aggregation (CA). In Release 10, Carrier Aggregation can support up to five carriers with
a total of 100 MHz; the more carriers that are combined, the higher the theoretical peak
speeds and typical user speeds
o Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) Smart Antennas are taken to new extremes in
LTE-Advanced, supporting a maximum of 8X8 MIMO on the downlink and 4X4 MIMO on
the uplink, thereby directly improving performance
o More intelligent Self-Organizing Networks (SON) and Coordinated Multipoint (CoMP) will
provide additional improvements
LTE-Advanced will have theoretical peak rates that exceed 1 Gbps
LTE-Advanced was commercialized in 2013 with rollouts on a wide-scale basis expected by year
end 2015
o Operator launches will typically include a subset of LTE-Advanced features and technical
capabilities including MIMO antenna systems, SON, Carrier Aggregation and CoMP
o There are twenty commercial LTE-Advanced networks in fifteen countries (August 2014)
with fifty additional networks in trial or deployment
o In North America, the four major carriers—AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon and Sprint—are in
various stages of deployment of LTE-Advanced based on 3GPP Release 10 standards.
AT&T and Sprint both launched commercial LTE-Advanced service in March 2014
o Global LTE-Advanced subscriptions are forecast to reach 927 million by the end of 2018,
representing 45% of the overall 2 billion LTE-related subscriptions5
o LTE-Advanced in 3GPP Release 12 is currently being developed for a significant
upgrade as it allows for reduced base station activity of ‘always on’ signaling as well as
easier integration and management of M2M devices
5 iDATE, August 2014.
www.4gamericas.org
4
LTE vs. LTE-ADVANCED KEY PERFORMANCE INDICATORS
Today’s spectrum crunch is likely to become tomorrow’s spectrum crisis
U.S. DEMAND VERSUS SPECTRUM6
The U.S. and the rest of the Americas region requires more spectrum to meet societies’ growing
appetite for mobile broadband services
New spectrum auctions in the U.S. for AWS-3 1755-1780/2155-2180 MHz in 2014 and the TV
Broadcast 600 MHz spectrum in 2015 will make a positive impact for the wireless industry
o AWS-3 will provide 50 MHz of internationally harmonized spectrum
6 Rysavy Research, 2011.
www.4gamericas.org
5
o 600 MHz TV Broadcast spectrum will provide much needed low band spectrum to the
marketplace
o Eighty percent of the most useful spectrum in the U.S. is currently in the hands of the
federal government7
o The 3550-3700 MHz spectrum in the U.S. is well suited for small cells
Licensed Shared Access could be utilized in these spectrum bands by mobile
network operators to maximize the amount of spectrum available to their cellular
customers
Latin America’s overall spectrum allocations have a significant shortfall from the ITU
recommendations for 2015, reaching only 20% of the anticipated spectrum requirements based
on current allocations for 20158
Today’s smartphones use 35 times more spectrum than traditional cell phones, and tablets use
121 times as much spectrum9
Global mobile data traffic is expected to grow 11-fold between 2013 and 201810
7 A voracious mobile world needs 'spectrum, spectrum, spectrum', CNET, 9 January 2014.
8 Analysis of ITU Spectrum Recommendation in the Latin America Region, Signals Telecom Consulting, August 2013.
9 FCC Initiates Incentive Auction Process, September 2012.
10 Cisco Visual Networking Index: Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update, February 2014.