demystifying in-building wireless (ibw) · demystifying in-building wireless (ibw) ... ericsson...

Demystifying In-Building Wireless (IBW)• The IBW opportunity and its challenges• The changing landscape in the IBW sector• IBW technologies & architectures choices• Best practice

Event: Small Cell SIG @ IDEALondonAuthor: Oliver BosshardDate: 27/04/2016Version: 1.0

27/04/2016 Company Confidential © Real Wireless Ltd. 2016

Agenda

• Introduction

• In-building wireless - the opportunity and its challenges

• The changing in-building landscape

• Dimensioning the in-building wireless problem

• In-building architecture and solution evolution

• Small Cells versus DAS

• Relevant factors & parameters for the right in-building solution

27/04/2016 2Company Confidential © Real Wireless Ltd. 2016

27/04/2016 Confidential & © Real Wireless Ltd. 2016. All rights reserved.

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Wireless

Technology

Spectrum Topolology

The IBW opportunity

• 80% of mobile traffic is generated indoors and this traffic is growing 20% faster each year than outdoor wireless traffic[1].

• Fewer than 2% of commercial and public buildings are currently covered by dedicated wireless indoor solutions[2].

• Mobile data growth forecast is 53% CAGR from 2015 – 2020[3].

• Mobile service as a utility: • Historically, essential utilities include

water, gas, electricity, fixed telephony & broadband

• Today, ubiquitous coverage for mobile telephony and mobile broadband areregarded as the 5th utility


Source: Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) Forecast, 2016

1 “Amdocs 2015 State of the RAN”, Amdocs, 20152 “In-Building Wireless”, ABI Research, April 2014 / “Wireless in Buildings”, Commscope, February 20163 “The Cisco Visual Networking Index (VNI) Global Mobile Data Traffic Forecast Update, Cisco, February 2016

The IBW challenge

• Ever increasing capacity demand whilst voice (although important) occupies only a fraction of the total capacity demand

• Gap between traffic increase and revenue growth

• Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) don’t have the budget or a valid business case to cover the remaining 98% of pubic/commercial buildings

• The MNOs are still key as they are the spectrum holders/owners.

• An increasing number of technologies (2G – 5G, WiFi, WiGig, PMR), solutions (e.g. LTE-U, LAA LTE, MulteFire) and frequency bands are available and (some of them) need to be supported to meet voice and data requirements


Source: Heavy Reading

Source: Ericsson Mobility Report 2015

Global mobile traffic (monthly ExaBytes)

Revenue versus Traffic Growth

Focus of this presentation is a challenging environment:

• Busy city centre (e.g. London City) with tall modern commercial buildings (skyscrapers). Other challenging environments are e.g. stadia and airports

This environment means:

• High population (worker) density

• Dense outdoor macro / micro network

• High capacity demand

• Multi-operator, band and technology

• Physical constraints such as: • Outside-in interference

• Modern buildings thermal efficiencies(reflecting windows can be a benefit)


IBW in a challenging environment

The changing landscape around IBW

Increasing thermal efficient buildings

• Highly thermal efficient “green” skyscrapers feature typically highly reflective windows. This reduces the outside-in coverage and increases the need for a dedicated IBW coverage solution.

• Given there is a IBW solution, reflective windows can be anadvantage, reducing unwanted outside-in coverage(or vice where IBW solutions could interfere outside)

• The outside window is the ideal demarcation point betweenan IBW cells and the outdoor cells.

• Independent of window attenuation, there are typically strongcompeting signal levels at the lower floors and high broadbandinterference at the higher levels of a skyscraper


RF signal reflecting from thermal efficient window

in a modem building


Change in business models• MNOs will not finance an IBW solution for public or

commercial buildings except:• If there is footfall in the millions such as LHR, Waterloo etc.

(typically multi-operator solutions) • It is a substantial corporate client (typically single operator

solution)

• Who will finance, design, install and maintain the IBW solution?• MNOs (historic carrier lead model)• Neutral hosts• Landlord owned (venue-led)• Potential hybrid models

• Landlords need to get mobile service in their buildings as it impacts their ability to let/sell/use it. This awareness leads to a change in landlords and developers approach - some setting budget aside for IBW solutions.



The change in IBW ownership and emergence of neutral hosts

• The options for landlords are “Venue Led” (e.g. BAA’s LHR T5) or “Neutral Host” (e.g. Cheesegrater in London)

• The emergence of Neutral Hosts1: • In the US about 70% of cellular infrastructure is owned and

managed by neutral hosts (e.g. Crown Castle & American Tower)

• Neutral host ownership in Europe is growing and currently at around 10-15%

• Neutral hosts have a long term business model of 10 – 15 years on infrastructure compared to the short MNO ROI targets

• Neutral hosts aim to offer shared infrastructure where possible


1 Neutral host market feedback based on Real Wireless market research

(1) Leadenhall Building / Cheesegrater(2) London Heathrow Terminal 5

The MNOs will still need to be involved for the connection to their network and as they own and control the mobile spectrum.


The IBW technologies and architectures

• Conventional Solutions

• Distributed Antenna Systems DAS:

• Active DAS

• Passive DAS

• Radio Remote Heads

• Small Cells

• DAS / Small Cell hybrid

• Other solutions:

• Wi-Fi / WiGig (licence exempt and limited in VoWiFi voice service)

• LTE-U / LAA LTE (still needs 4G/LTE coverage for signalling traffic)

• MulteFire (fully licence exempt 5 GHz LTE)27/04/2016 11Company Confidential © Real Wireless Ltd. 2016

DAS versus Small Cells

• DAS and Small Cells have both their advantages and disadvantages

• DAS:• Skills needed for deployment and expensive (Capex & Opex)

• DAS needs base stations and the cabling is coax based

• Larger systems work with optical remote units

• Future proof, multi-operator/band/technology

• Full flexibility with antenna type choice and placement

• Small Cells:• Cat5/Cat6 PoE fed

• Cost efficient and easy to install (Wi-Fi like)

• Needs just the MNO backhaul (could be building owners also)

• Technology, operators and bands limited

• Less flexibility and choice with antenna type and placement


Small Cell architecture

Level 6

Level 5

Level 4

Level 3

Level 2

Level 1

Basementx5

28m

32m

36m

40m

44m

48m

DAS architecture

Best practice considerations regarding IBW solutions

• Coverage is not the key criteria, what's really required is: • Dominant best server signal for good performance

• Sufficient supported spectrum to meet the capacity (traffic) needs

• Antenna power and positioning is key• Dominate outside-in signals

• Antennas at the extremities of the building pointing inwards

• Supporting older and newer technologies: • Supporting voice and data

• Supporting older and newer phones

• Operator neutrality• Allow all visitors to use their devices

• Allows tenants using different MNOs

• Costs and future proofing• Small Cell are cheaper to deploy compared to DAS but they

are less scalable / future proof


Small Cell capex savings for new 3G & 4G solution over MIMO DAS (Source: RW study)

Ideal antenna placement

Which solution is best for you

IBW planning considerations:

Coax vs Cat5/Cat6

Single-operator/technology/band vs. multi-operator/technology/bands

Venue led vs neutral host

Quick fix vs future proof

Food for thought:

Is there an opportunity for a neutral operator? (requires spectrum)


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demystifying in-building wireless (ibw) · demystifying in-building wireless (ibw) ... ericsson...

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