By John Kuzin, Vice President, Spectrum Policy & Regulatory Counsel – Qualcomm Government Affairs
Note: This blog was produced under WIA’s Innovation and Technology Council (ITC). The ITC is the forum for forecasting the future of the wireless industry. Participants explore developments in the wider wireless industry, from 5G network monetization trends and streamlining infrastructure deployment to future spectrum needs and cell site power issues. The group is publishing a series of thought-leadership pieces throughout 2024.
Mobile data demand continues to increase so rapidly that its growth chart over the past year resembles a hockey stick.
One of the greatest data demands driving the need for increased mobile network capacity is the emergence of augmented reality, virtual reality, extended reality and mixed reality (aka “AR/VR/XR/MR”) applications. Meta’s Oculus headset (now in its third generation under the brand name Meta Quest) has been available for years and is continually advancing. Apple also recently released the Apple Vision Pro, an AR/VR headset it describes as a revolutionary spatial computer transforming how people work, collaborate, connect, relive memories and enjoy entertainment. At Qualcomm, we are working on developing AR/VR/XR/ MR capabilities in a headset that merges the physical and digital worlds. The data demands for consumer technologies like these useful headsets as they continue to grow in popularity and use will require increased mobile network capacity and drive the need for more spectrum.
Over the past several decades, mobile operators have updated their networks and accumulated additional spectrum to support increasing demands driven by growing mobile data usage. One way operators address this demand is by migrating to newer wireless technology generations – moving from 3G to 4G and to 5G. Each mobile technology generation supports greater capacity or, in techno-speak, greater bits per second per Hertz. Another way mobile operators address increased capacity needs is by densifying their networks – installing more base stations closer to users enabling more intensive frequency re-use.
However, even with those two tools, the data demands on mobile 5G networks and indoor Wi-Fi networks that use unlicensed spectrum continue to increase at such a rapid pace that more spectrum is needed. Without additional spectrum, the effective capability of these applications will diminish. Moreover, when users are unable to take advantage of new applications, uses and services that require greater data throughput, innovation will come to a grinding halt.
Spectrum Possibilities
Each new technology generation operates using wider bandwidths. The widest bandwidth that 4G supported was a 20-megahertz channel below 7 GHz. The widest channelization that 5G uses is 100 megahertz, and 6G is being designed to support a bandwidth of 400 to 500 megahertz in bands between 7.1 and 15 GHz. In the lower spectrum bands used in today’s wireless networks, there are no mobile network channels that are 400 megahertz wide. There is a need for additional upper-mid-band spectrum in the 7.1 to 15 GHz range for future 6G networks as well as additional lower mid-band spectrum for 5G and 5G Advanced networks.
New licensed mobile spectrum has not been opened in the United States in a number of years. Although this is concerning, the release of the National Spectrum Strategy Implementation Plan, which includes several important bands identified for commercial use, is promising. One option is the National Spectrum Strategy. The industry is looking at is the band between 7.1 and 8.4 GHz, which includes enough spectrum to allow several mobile carriers to each have a 400-megahertz channel for 6G use. That will require work, though, because there are important incumbent users in this band that need to be protected, moved, or condensed within less spectrum.
The FCC has a proceeding looking at opening 550 megahertz from 12.7 to 13.25 GHz, but that band is used by many Earth Stations on Mobile Platforms (ESOMPs) outside of the United States. As such, it may not be a good candidate for global harmonization, which is important for economies of scale in the product development cycle. Bands don’t need to perfectly align around the world, as manufacturers can engineer products that cover an entire band that different countries may only have opened pieces of. Global harmonization is useful, but supporting a wider tuning range allows these devices to operate successfully in multiple countries, so long as the frequencies are in the same general range.
New Technologies
New RF technologies will multiply the benefits of new spectrum. For example, Qualcomm has designed a Giga-MIMO antenna for 6G using an experimental license for the 13 GHz band that will allow greater frequency re-use within the same cell using directed beams to support large numbers of users simultaneously. For example, if 400 megahertz is made available in the 7.1 to 15 GHz range for a particular carrier, multiple users in a specific area could have access to the full spectrum because the antennas are designed to be highly directive. Our goal is to use the antennas that will operate in this new upper mid-band spectrum range to achieve the same coverage outdoors and with better performance by reusing cell sites presently supporting lower frequency bands.
Another technology advance that helps to use spectrum resources more efficiently is reduced capability (RedCap) devices outlined in 3GPP Release 17. RedCap uses the advanced 5G waveform to support massive numbers of low-demand IoT devices in an energy-efficient and spectrally efficient way. RedCap devices may be used to sense gas leaks in a given location; most of the time they don’t transmit, but when there’s a leak, they send an alert. These sensors also can be designed to operate on solar power, so they will not require electrical power lines to be run to power each device, lowering deployment costs and lasting for many years without field maintenance.
Spectrum Sharing
Spectrum Sharing is a broad term describing different ways spectrum can be deployed to increase its efficiency. Most of the unlicensed bands in use today are shared. In the 6 GHz band in the United States, for example, the main incumbents are fixed point-to-point links, and sharing is allowed in the band so long as the fixed operations are protected. Another form of spectrum sharing is a co-primary use structure, where two different users have equal rights to the same band but coordinate to protect each other.
There is also a lot of talk about dynamic spectrum sharing inside of U.S. federal agencies; a form of dynamic spectrum sharing is used in the U.S. in the 3.55 to 3.7 GHz band known as Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS). Because the naval stations are mobile – for example, on a ship coming into port or leaving – the Navy’s use of the spectrum varies and sharing opportunities are dynamic. Commercial users are allowed to share this band with naval radars, so long as the radars are protected from the signals of licensed commercial operators.
When considering sharing spectrum, it’s important to know how populated the spectrum is, what you are trying to operate around and if the current incumbents can use less spectrum more effectively or move out of the band. By doing that, more capabilities for commercial use can be made available.
Qualcomm is eager to work with the federal government to continue opening spectrum bands for new commercial purposes, particularly for 6G operations in the upper mid-band range.
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