LTE: Long Term Evolution of 3GPP
Karthik Budigere Ramakrishna Nagasai Panchakarla
Email: kbudiger@cc.hut.fi Email: npanchak@cc.hut.fi
Abstract—3GPP is in the process of defining the long term
evolution (LTE) and long-term evolution advanced LTE
Advanced)for gaining the 4G technology status, in order to
maintain the future competitiveness of 4G technology. The
main targets for this evolution concern increased data rates,
improved coverage, reduced latency and interworking with
other telecom technologies. This paper discusses about the
overview of LTE and talks about the network architecture,
protocol architecture and mobility features of LTE.
Keywords-LTE,3GPP,4G Technology.
I. INTRODUCTION
Long Term Evolution (LTE) is the standardization
process for mobile communication systems by Third
Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). It is the step towards
4G technologies and to ensure the competitive advantage of
3G technologies for the future. It has evolved from its
predecessors like GSM, GPRS, EDGE, WCDMA, HSPA to
achieve high data rates, low latency with an all IP Network
Architecture rather than circuit switching model of its
predecessors. LTE along with System Architecture Evolution
(SAE) comprise of Evolved Packet System (EPS) in which
core network and radio access are packet switched. The basic
idea of the LTE framework is to develop a system high
throughput, low latency and optimized packet data traffic
which is achieved by multiple access techniques, bandwidth
scalability, channel structure and network architecture. In the
near future, deployment of LTE based mobile services
provides various challenges and opportunities for the
operators and equipment manufacturers. LTE can coexist
with earlier 3GPP technologies and supports both frequency
division duplexing (FDD) and time division duplexing
(TDD). LTE’s spectral efficiency is increased by four times
when compared to UTRA, ten times improvement users per
cell when compared to WCDMA radio access technologies
because of MIMO and improvements in architecture,
signaling and round trip delays.
The key features for LTE development are
• High spectral efficiency.
• Low latency.
• Simplified network and protocol architecture.
• Coexisting with earlier 3GPP technologies.
• Flexible use of frequency bands and variable bandwidth
support.
• Inter-working with other systems.
• Support for both FDD and TDD.
Binoy Chemmagate Shourov Kumar Roy
Email: bchemmag@cc.hut.fi Email: skroy@cc.hut.fi
II. BACKGROUND
The standardization process for LTE began at 3GPP
Toronto workshop, 2004. At which various views and
proposals were contributed by various operators for the
evolution of then existed UTRAN (UMTS Terrestrial Radio
Access Network). Subsequently in December 2004, 3GPP
started study to develop framework for evolution to achieve
high data rates for both uplink and downlink transmissions,
low latency, by which voice applications and real time
services will be improved greatly, and packet optimized
technologies. The target was to have data rates three to four
times of Release 6 HSDPA levels and two to three times of
HSUPA levels. In 2007, E UTRA (evolved UTRA) was
approved from study stage to first technical specifications.
The feasibility study set the peak data rates with 20 MHz
bandwidth for DL and UL are of 300 Mbps and 75 Mbps
respectively. The peak data rates for uplink and downlink
from HSPA to LTE are given below figure 1 (UMTS Forum
2008).
Figure 1. Uplink and Downlink rates compared from HSPA to LTE
(UMTS Forum 2008)
By passing many legacy requirements of UMTS/HSPA,
3GPP releases 7 and 8 allows introduction of simple flat IP
oriented architecture coined as HSPA+ (High Speed Packet
Access) and then LTE. HSPA+ served as a bridge between
HSPA and LTE. The concept of all IP network is hinted as
early as Release 4 by 3GPP. The first LTE base
specifications are specified in 3GPP Release 8, December
2008. The key features of Release 8 are as shown in the
figure 2. The specifications development was continued
further and on December 2009 Release 9 was frozen. Stage 1
specifications development work for Release 10 is going on
at present.

TABLE I. LTE RELEASE-8 PARAMETERS (3GPP)
UL SC-FDMA
Access Scheme DL OFDMA
Bandwidth 1.4,3,5,10,15,20 MHz
Minimum TTI 1msec
Sub-carrier spacing 1.5KHz
Cyclic Prefix Length Short: 4.7µsec, long: 16.7µsec
Modulation QPSK,16QAM,64QAM
Spatial Multiplexing Single layer for UL per UE
Up to 4 layers for DL per UE
MU-MIMO supported for UL
and DL
In LTE the higher data rates are achieved by new
technological solutions in the radio interface and access
network like orthogonal frequency division multiplexing
(OFDM), multiple input / multiple output (MIMO), high rate
modulation etc, which were agreed in Figure 1. LTE Release
8 Features the 3GPP workshops and have been standardized
(UMTS Forum, 2009). LTE uses air interface according to
the demand adaptively rather than fixed shared resources,
this increases the efficiency of the air interface.
A. Multicarrier air interface
As specified in 3GPP Release 8, LTE uses completely
new radio access network. It uses OFDMA based modulation
and multiple access scheme for the downlink and SC-FDMA
(Single Carrier Frequency division multiple access) for the
uplink. To achieve high data rate, relatively low cost and
power efficient hardware, OFDM based technology is
chosen. SC-FDMA is similar to OFDMA and since its more
power efficient, it can be used in hand held devices with
battery power. In OFDMA, 20 MHz channel is subdivided
into many sub channels and are assigned to different users.
These sub channels are used to send data simultaneously
generating high data throughput. The high throughput is also
related to modulation of data, different modulation
techniques are used to transmit the data. They are QPSK,
16QAM, and 64QAM for downlink and BPSK, QPSK,
8PSK and 16QAM for uplink.
B. MIMO
MIMO basically make use of multiple antennas to send
data and multiple antennas to receive. Transmission is done
by converting serial bit stream into multiple parallel sub
streams and sending via multiple antennas using same time
slot and same frequency band. Receiver separates the sub
streams from mixed signals. Thus high data throughput is
achieved. MIMO minimizes the effect of noise also and
increases the utilization of spectrum. Shannon’s law is
maintained in each individual radio link but collectively
MIMO can exceed it. Information loss by a single
transmission can be reduced by sending same information by
using multiple antennas for transmission and multiple
antennas for receiving.
C. Bandwidth scalability and Multi Band
LTE system provides flexible bandwidth utilization with
different carrier bandwidths ranging from 1.25 MHz to
20MHz (more specifically: 1.4 MHz, 5 MHz, 5 MHz, 10
MHz, 15 MHz and 20 MHz). 15 KHz sub carrier spacing
remains same for all the above options. LTE can be rolled
out in any 3GPP system’s frequency bands which include
International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 (IMT-2000)
core bands (1.9-2GHz), its extension bands (2.5GHz) as well
as 850-900MHz, 1800 MHz and Advanced Wireless
Services spectrum (1.7- 2.1GHz). 900 MHz frequencies can
be used in rural areas in which the optimal cell sizes can be
lesser but where as acceptable performance can be achieved
for cell sizes of many kilometers. Higher frequency bands
can be used in urban areas where as cell sizes will be smaller
but provides high speed mobility. But because of this
complex situation arises for the operators because of the
interference between various generations and different
technologies coexisting in particular frequency bands.
Interference is inevitable because of closeness of GSM900
band and UMTS900 band. In future 2G, 3G and LTE
networks have to coexist and this causes more co-channel
and adjacent channel interference.
D. Evolved Packet Core(All IP)
Evolved Packet core (EPC) is designed for seamless
interworking with IP based communication networks with
simplified network architecture. It is completely packed
based which provides end to end IP connection from mobile
device to core network and vice versa. Multimedia and
circuit calls are mainly handled through converged IMS (IP
Multimedia subsystem) core which is recently termed as
VoLTE (voice over LTE). . IMS, was first introduced in
3GPP release 5 standards, is an SIP (Session Initiation
Protocol) based session and service platform to deliver
multimedia applications over broadband networks. The
main challenge in VoLTE will be implementing certain
minimal set to quality requirements for voice, SMS and
supplementary services. The functionalities of RNC have
been moved to eNodeB which connects directly to evolved
packet core. EPC offers inter working, connectivity,
mobility and handover various 3GPP, 3GPP2 technologies
and also with wifi, fixed line broadband technologies etc.
The network architecture is discussed in the subsequent
sections.
 III. LTE NETWORK ARCHITECTURE
LTE has been designed under the assumption that all
services would be packet-switched. This is the reason why
LTE is not following the circuit-switched model of earlier
systems. LTE’s aim is to provide seamless IP connectivity
between User Equipment and Packet Data Network without
causing any disruption to the applications of end users
during mobility. LTE (Release 8) architecture contains E-
UTRAN (Evolved-UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access
Network) accompanied by an evolution of the non-radio
aspects termed as System Architecture Evolution (SAE).
SAE includes the Evolved Packet Core (EPC) Network.
Thus, LTE and SAE together build the Evolved Packet
System (EPS) that contains fully packet-switched core
network and radio access network.
UE (User Equipment), E-UTRAN and EPC (all together
the Evolved Packet System) represent the Internet Protocol
Connectivity Layer as shown in Figure 2. This layer is
optimized only for IP based connectivity. All services will
be offered on top of IP. In Figure 2, the Services
Connectivity layer is shown as well which includes the
operator services and internet. IMS (Internet Multimedia
Sub-System) can be used in the Services Connectivity Layer
to provide services on top of the IP connectivity layer. IMS
can provide Voice over IP and interconnectivity to circuit
switched networks through its media gateways to support
voice service. One of the big architectural changes in
LTE/SAE architecture is that circuit switched nodes and
interfaces available in the earlier 3GPP architectures are not
present in the E-UTRAN and EPC of LTE/SAE
architecture.
Figure 2. System Architecture of LTE Network
EPS network is comprised of the Core Network and the
Access Network, where the core network has many logical
nodes and the Access Network has one node named as the
evolved NodeB (eNodeB) which connects to the User
Equipments (UEs). User Equipment means a device that
converts media to and from UMTS LTE radio signals and it
can be of different types of devices ranging from mobile
telephone to digital televisions.
A. The Core Network
The key goal of Evolved Packet Core is to enhance
service provisioning as well as to simplify internetworking
with non-3GPP mobile networks. The features of EPC
promise an all-IP core network with flat architecture that
supports higher throughput, lower latency as well as support
for mobility between 3GPP (GSM, UMTS etc.) and non-
3GPP (CDMA, WiMAX etc.) radio access technologies.
The core network (EPC) has the following logical nodes,
 Packet Data Network Gateway (P-GW)
 Serving Gateway (S-GW)
 Mobility Management Entity (MME)
 Policy and Charging Resource Function (PCRF)
 Home Subscriber Server (HSS)
1) Packet Data Network Gateway (P-GW): P-GW
works as the mobility anchor point for the inter-networking
with non-3GPP technologies such as CDMA 2000 and
WiMAX networks. P-GW is also responsible for the IP
address allocation for the User Equipment (UE). It does the
QoS enforcement for Guaranteed Bit Rate bearers and flow
based charging depending on the PCRF (Policy Control and
Charging Rules Function) rules. It also performs the
filtering based on TFTs (Traffic Flow Templates).
2) Serving Gateway (S-GW): S-GW works as the
mobility anchor for inter-working with other 3GPP
technologies such as GPRS and UMTS. Also when an UE
moves between eNodeBs, S-GW serves as the local
mobility anchor for the data bearers. It performs some
additional functions in the visited network, such as,
collecting information (e.g. volume of data sent to or
received from the user) for charging and legal interception.
3) Mobility Management Entity (MME): MME is the
control element in EPC that takes care of the signaling part
between the Core Network and UE. MME also handles the
security functions for both signaling and user data.The
functions of MME can be categorized as follows,
 Functions related to bearer management: It includes the
establishment, maintenance and release of the bearers.
Session management layer in the NAS Protocol (Non-
Access Stratum Protocol: It runs between the UE and
CN) handles these functions.
 Functions related to connection management: The
establishment of the connection and security between
the network and UE belong to these functions.
Connection or mobility management layer in the NAS
Protocol handles these functions.
4) Policy and Charging Resource Function (PCRF): It
is the network element which is responsible for policy
control and controlling the flow-based charging
functionalities in the PCEF (Policy Control Enforcement
Function) located in the P-GW. The information PCRF
provides to the PCEF is called the Policy and Charging
Control (PCC) rules. Each PCRF may be associated with
one or more P-GW and S-GW.
5) Home Subscriber Server (HSS): HSS is the
repository of users subscription data (EPS-subscribed QoS
profile and any access restrictions for roaming etc.). It also
contains the information about the PDNs to which the user
can connect. The Authentication Center (AuC) can also be
integrated with the HSS.
B. The Access Network
The Access Network (E-UTRAN) consists of a network
of eNodeBs (Figure 3). The eNodeB is a radio base station
that controls all the radio related functions. Generally the
eNodeBs are distributed throughout the networks coverage
area. The eNodeB is the termination point of all the radio
related protocols. It relays the data between the radio
connection and the corresponding IP based connectivity
towards the EPC.
Figure 3. E-UTRAN Architecture
The eNodeBs are interconnected with each other by the
interface X2. eNodeB connects to the EPC by the interface
S1. More specifically it can be said that, EnodeB connects
to the MME by means of the S1-MME interface and to the
S-GW by means of the S1-U interface.
The radio related functions for which E-UTRAN is
responsible can be summarized briefly as follows,
• Radio Resource Management: This includes all the
functions which are related to radio bearers, such as,
 Radio bearer control,
 Radio admission control,
 Radio mobility control,
 Scheduling and dynamic allocation of resources to
UEs in both uplink and downlink.
• Header Compression: E-UTRAN does the compression of
IP packet headers. This compression reduces the overhead
in the network significantly and thus EUTRAN ensures the
efficient use of radio interface.
• Security: Encryption is done when data is sent over the
radio interface.
• Connectivity to the EPC: This includes signaling towards
the MME and the bearer path towards the S-GW.
IV. INTER-WORKING ARCHITECTURE
EPS supports inter-working and mobility (handover) with
networks using other Radio Access Technologies, such as,
GSM, UMTS, CDMA2000 and WiMAX. Figure 4 shows
the architecture for inter-working with other networks. The
S-GW acts as the mobility anchor for inter-working with
other 3GPP technologies (Figure 4), such as, GSM and
UMTS and the P-GW serves as an anchor allowing seamless
mobility to non-3GPP networks such as CDMA2000 or
WiMAX.
Figure 4. Internetworking Architecture
 V. PROTOCOL ARCHITECTURE
Main protocols stacks are User plane protocols and
Control plane protocols
A. User plane protocols
The user plane protocols are composed of three sub layers
namely Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP) layer,
Radio Link Control (RLC) layer, and Medium Access
Control layer (MAC).
Figure 5. LTE User Plane Protocol Stack
1) Packet Data Convergence Protocol (PDCP): The
main objective of this layer is to process the Radio Resource
Control (RRC) messages in control plane and Internet
Protocol (IP) packets in user plane. PDCP has the following
functions, header compression and decompression of user
plane data using Robust Header Compression (ROHC),
Security functions such as ciphering and integrity
protection, Handover support functions for ordering of
PDU’s, two types of handovers are seamless handover and
lossless handover and finally discarding the user plane data
when time out happens.
2) Radio Link Control (RLC): RLC almost act as a
middleware between PDCP and MAC, RLC make sure that
PDU’s from PDCP is segmented to MAC acceptable size as
well as MAC layer output is reassembled to construct PDCP
PDU’s. One main difference between UMTS and LTE is the
HARQ operation, the process of reordering of RLC PDU’s
is performed in RLC layer instead of MAC layer. RLC
entities can be in three modes of data transmissions, they are
Transparent mode (TM), Unacknowledged Mode (UM) and
Acknowledged Mode (AM).
3) Medium Access Control (MAC): MAC layer is
responsible for the multiplexing and de-multiplexing
between logical and transport channels, MAC SDU’s are
converted to MAC PDU’s for transmission and reverse is
done during reception. Logical channels are either control
logical channels or traffic logical channels. Whereas the
transport channels are either downlink transport channels or
uplink transport channels. The main functions of MAC layer
is Scheduling, Random Access Procedure, Uplink Timing
Alignment, Discontinuous reception (DRX), Multiplexing
and Logical channel partitioning.
B. Control plane protocols
Control plane mainly deals with radio-related functions.
The UE can be in two states either its RRC_IDLE or
RRC_CONNECTED. Former is the state when UE is idle
and cell selection is happening, whereas later requires the
radio resources to be allocated to UE.
Figure 6. LTE Control Plane Protocol Stack
• Radio Resource Control (RRC): Radio Resource Control
(RRC) protocol has the job of transferring common and
dedicated NAS information and also notifying the incoming
calls to UE’s in RRC_IDLE state. The functional areas of
RRC are System Information, RRC connection control,
Network controlled inter-RAT mobility, Measurement
configuration and reporting and finally few miscellaneous
functions such as NAS information transfer and UE radio
access capability information. System information makes
sure the parameters are present for the initial connection to
be made; It helps in cell selection and re-selection
procedures. The handover and mobility in LTE is secured.
UE performs various measurements for getting cell
information when there is no uplink or downlink.
• Different type of selections: Once the UE is stable it
makes the selection of Public Land Mobile Network
(PLMN), PLMN’s are selected according to the quality and
registration compatibility. Once the PLMN is selected the
next step is to select a cell. Cell is selected by checking for
strongest cell on all supported carrier frequencies. After this
UE wants to be in the best cell available so it keeps
measuring the quality of cells to hop into the best cell.
VI. QUALITY OF SERVICE (QOS)
According to the service provided the bearers can be
broadly classified into Minimum Guaranteed Bit Rate (GBR)
bearers and Non-GBR bearers. While the former is useful for
VoIP where a minimum amount of resource has to be
reserved, later mainly deals with unreliable operations such
as web browsing and files downloading where the rate can
vary from minimum to maximum.
A. QoS Class Identifier (QCI) and Allocation and Retention
Priority (ARP)
QCI determines how the packet should be handled in
eNodeB. Three main factors determined by QCI are priority,
packet delay budget and acceptable packet loss rate.
TABLE II. QOS CLASS IDENTFIERS FOR LTE
ARP determines the call admission control; in effect it
controls the establishment decision in case of radio
congestion. After the call admission the QoS factors are
determined by QCI, GBR and MBR. The QoS information
of bearer is included in bearer setup request made to eNodeB
which in turn helps the eNodeB to provide QoS through the
call admission control and packet level priorities like QCI.
VII. SECURITY
The LTE security is similar to GSM and UMTS. Security
comes in two flavors, one is ciphering and other is integrity
protection. Ciphering is available for both user plane and
control plane data whereas integrity protection is given to
control plane data alone.
A. Key management techniques
LTE follows common secret key KASME (Access
Security Management Entity) shared by Authentication
centre in Home Subscriber Server (HSS) and
USIM(Universal Subscriber Identity Module) in UE (User
Equipment). Authentication is done using checksums and
keys generated by random number and common secret key.
Once connection is established two types of keys are
generated, one is AS base-key KeNB, related to eNodeB. AS
derived-keys are generated using KeNB. Handover within E-
UTRAN requires new base and derived keys generated from
base key of source cell is transferred from E-UTRAN to
UTRAN is or GERN requires key generation from integrity
and ciphering key in UTRAN or GERN. The whole security
functions involving integrity protection and ciphering
functions is controlled by PDCP layer. It is possible to use a
NULL cipher algorithm for making emergency calls. The
different keys which are used are derived as shown in the
figure bellow.
Figure 7. LTE Key Derivations
 VIII. CONNECTION MANAGEMENT The paging information is provided to upper layers, which in
response may initiate RRC connection establishment when
A. Initial Attach Procedure:
the UE is in RRC_IDLE state, e.g. to receive an incoming
The Initial Attach procedure happens when the UE is call. The MME initiates the paging procedure by sending the
powered on. This procedure is required by UE to attach itself PAGING message to each enodeB with cells belonging to
to the network for further operation. The procedure starts the tracking area in which the UE is registered. Each enodeB
with the cell search where as to find the cell to which it has can contain cells belonging to different tracking areas,
to attach. And it performs the random access procedure to whereas each cell can only belong to one tracking area. On
get the slots for the data transmission. Then UE will initiate receiving this message the enodeB transmits this to UE.
the RRC connection procedure to establish the initial
connection, perform security negotiation and to establish the
default bearer connection for the data transfer. Prior to this
the S1 setup has to be completed where the eNodeB is
attached to the network (MME). This S1 connection will
remain active until the eNodeB is functioning. The Home
Subscriber System understands diameter protocol. Once
MME receives Attach Request, it queries HSS for
authentication details. HSS sends the authentication vectors
to MME in Authentication Info Answer. Networks requests
UE for Auth vectors. Once UE provides the same MME
compares the same with what HSS has sent. If they match
UE is authenticated. Next is security. After the security all
the NAS messages are encrypted using the security
algorithms that were exchanged.

Figure 9. Paging Procedure

IX. ROAMING ARCHITECTURE

Roaming is important feature of mobile networks which
allows user subscribed to one network in a country to get
services with the different network in the place other than the
home location. A roaming user is connected to the
EUTRAN, MME and S-GW of the visited LTE network.
However, LTE/SAE allows the P-GW of either the visited or
the home network to be used, as shown in Figure. Using the
home networks P-GW allows the user to access the home
operator’s services even while in a visited network.

Figure 8. Initial Attach Procedure

B. Paging:
The purpose of this procedure is to transmit paging
information to a UE in RRC_IDLE and UEs in
RRC_CONNECTED about a system information change. Figure 10. LTE Roaming Architecture
 X. MOBILITY MANAGEMENT B. X2 Handover procedure:
X2 handover is directly performed between two eNodeBs
LTE supports mobility within the LTE/SAE architecture which makes preparation phase quicker.X2 handover like S1
(Intra-LTE Mobility) and also mobility with the non-3GPP handover it has the Handover Preparation, Execution and
technologies. Handover is initiated based on the following Notify phases. The MME is informed once after the
reasons/measurements, handover is successful so that it can trigger the path switch
• Quality-based Handovers procedure. X2 handover can be further categorized based on
• Coverage-based Handovers the resilience to packet loss they are,
• Load-based Handovers
The mobility procedures happen on the network interfaces, • Seamless - Less interruption time and fast move of UE
LTE has handover on its two interfaces S1 and X2 S1 from source to target eNodeB.
Handover happens on the S1 interface this means the • Lossless - Zero tolerance for the loss of packets.
decision to trigger relocation happens on the S1 interface. X2
handover procedure is used for the inter eNodeB handover.
LTE handover procedure supports multiple preparation
phases in LTE by which the source eNodeB can trigger
handover preparation procedure with several target eNodeBs.
A. S1 Handover procedure:
S1 handover happens on the S1 interface, the procedure is
divided in to three different stages. It starts with the
Handover Preparation phase. In this phase is to request the
preparation of resources at the target side. The second phase
is Handover Execution Phase, in this phase UE is notified
about the handover and the details of target eNodeB and the
UE context transfer happens from source eNodeB to target
eNodeB. The final phase is the Handover Notify Phase
(Completion) to indicate MME that the UE has arrived to the
target eNodeB and the S1 handover has been successfully
completed.

Figure 12. X2 Handover Procedure

C. Inter-Radio Access Technologies (RAT) Mobility:

LTE supports the several other Radio Access
Technologies and it can co exist with other technologies.
RAT here refers to the technologies such as UMTS, CDMA
2000 etc. LTE - UMTS handover procedure is almost similar
to the S1 handover procedure and the only change will be
exception of the STATUS-TRANSFER message since no
PDCP context is continued. LTE - CDMA2000: S1
CDMA2000 tunneling procedures are to carry CDMA2000
signaling between UE and CDMA2000 RAT over the S1
interface.
The CDMA2000 messages are transported in an IE of the
Figure 11. S1 Handover Procedure
DOWNLINK S1 CDMA2000 TUNNELING or UPLINK S1
CDMA2000 TUNNELING messages.
 XI. DEPLOYMENTS AND INDUSTRY
Operators planning an LTE deployment will need to
consider the implications of utilizing LTE in an ecosystem
comprising 2G, 3G, and future ―4G‖ wireless technologies. It
will be years before LTE RF coverage replicates that of
GSM, GPRS and UMTS. Therefore, operators planning an
LTE deployment will need to offer multi-technology devices
with networks that allow mobility and service continuity
between GSM, GPRS, UMTS and LTE.
The first deployment of the LTE network was seen in
December 2009 by the TeliaSonera which launched its LTE
services in Sweden and Norway and an estimated 17
operators are expected to launch the LTE networks in 2010.
Nearly 130 operators around the world are having plans to
move to Long Term Evolution by 2015 [10].
The migration towards LTE network is expected to
happen by 2015 and some of the main aspects where the
operators are concentrating are different strategies for
deploying LTE networks. The best optimal way for doing
this will be deployment of LTE Data-Only Services on LTE
and 2G-3G for voice. Since most of the operators moving to
LTE have already working 2G-3G networks this option is
most suitable for them and later stages both the Voice and
Data Services can be moved on LTE.
As per the research published by the Juniper Networks it
forecasts that the service revenues for mobile operators will
exceed $70 billion pa and also over 100 million LTE users
by 2014, the main LTE markets include North America,
Western Europe and the Far East & China.
Figure 13. LTE Revenues by 2014
Pyramid expects LTE to grow more rapidly than
preceding mobile standards in terms of subscriptions. ―While
it took nearly six years for UMTS/HSPA to reach 100
million subscriptions, Pyramid predicts that LTE will take
just over four years to reach the same milestone‖. It also
predicts that the ―The number of LTE subscriptions
worldwide will grow at a CAGR of 404 percent from 2010 to
2014 and reach 136 million by year-end 2014‖.
The LTE suppliers are fully prepared to enter the market
and start helping the service providers to deploy the LTE
networks with list of wide variety of products. Ericsson is
one of the leading LTE solution providers which deployed
the first Commercial LTE network with TeliaSonera. Some
of the other major LTE solution providers include Alcatel-
Lucent, Nokia Siemens Networks, Motorola, Fujitsu,
Huawei, Starrent Networks, Samsung, Bridgewater Systems,
Wintegra, ZTE and many more.
The chipset manufactures such as Broadcom, Infineon
and Qualcomm, have established LTE product development
plans, according to market research and the new market
entrants, including companies such as Altair Semiconductor,
Beceem, BitWave, Comsys, Sequans and Wavesat, are also
geared up for LTE and developing new chipsets and products
for LTE. Beceem Communications is one step ahead of its
competent since it announced the BCS500, which is the first
chip that integrates LTE and WiMax onto the same silicon.
XII. FUTURE OF LTE
LTE Advanced of 3GPP target is to fulfill the
requirements of 4G technologies, also called IMT Advanced,
as defined by the International Telecommunication Union.
LTE Advanced is expected to be included in 3GPP release
10.Compatibilty with the first release of LTE equipment is
one of the primary requirements of LTE Advanced. The
various proposals came up under the LTE Advanced are
carrier aggregation, extension of multi antenna solutions like
spatial multiplexing, COMP which is cordinated multiple
transmitters and receivers with coordinated scheduling
between basestations, enegry efficiency and relay
functionaly which provides increased reachability or
increased data rates.
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[6] Harri Holma, Antti Toskala, LTE for UMTS: OFDMA SCFDMA
Based Radio Access, John Wiley and Sons Ltd., 2009.
[7] 3GPP Technical Specification 36.413,S1 Application Protocol
(S1AP) (Release 8), www.3gpp.org.
[8] 3GPP Technical Specification 33.401, System Architecture Evolution
(SAE): Security Architecture (Release 8), www.3gpp.org.
[9] 3GPP Technical Specification 36.300, Evolved Universal Terrestrial
Radio Access (E-UTRA) and Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio
Access Network (E-UTRAN); Overall description; Stage2 (Release
8), www.3gpp.org.
[10] LTE Deployment Status by www.3gamericas.org
[11] 3GPP Technical Specification 36.331, Evolved Universal Terrestrial
Radio Access (E-UTRA) and Evolved Universal Terrestrial Radio
Access Network (E-UTRAN); Radio Resouce Control(RRC) Protocol
Specification (Release 8), www.3gpp.org.