Dokumentnamn

Coverage Requirements for UMTS

Prepared
Per Wirdemark

Date Rev
2004-09-02

Document - Ref
PTS-ER-2004:32

Page
1 (18)

HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.



1 SUMMARY


The purpose of this report is to find out how the signal requirement matches the service
requirement in a UMTS network, and to comment on some of the specific issues raised by
the Swedish Operators in a request for changed requirements. The key findings from the
report are:

UMTS coverage is in the majority of the situations limited by the uplink while the coverage
requirements for the UMTS License holders in Sweden is set on the downlink. This means
that the licence criteria can not be evaluated / determined without making some assumptions
on how base stations are configured.

The aspects that have most impact on the signal requirement are:

- building penetration loss, and its variation in different types of buildings
- the use or non-use of tower mounted low noise amplifiers on the uplink
- the interference level in the network

The link budget calculations show that current license requirement of 58 dBuV / m measured
on the primary common pilot channel is a too low requirement in city centres, while it is too
high in rural areas. Suggested range is from 65 dBuV / m in dense city centres to 50 dBuV /
m in rural areas.

Buildings in city centres are normally big constructions of concrete or brick, while
habituated buildings in rural areas are primarily single family houses constructed out of
wood. This difference in construction means a difference in penetration loss, which
motivates a 9 dB difference in signal strength requirement to achieve the same service level
in both environments.

Differences in uplink interference level in high and low traffic areas can motivate an
additional 2 dB difference between dense urban and rural areas.

Coverage in areas with low traffic and therefore low interference will be limited by the
uplink performance, and the use of tower mounted amplifiers can improve the uplink
performance by 4-5 dB. If tower mounted amplifiers are used in rural areas and not in urban
areas, the additional difference in signal requirement to achieve same service level should be
approximately 4 dB.

50 dBuV / m should be a sufficient coverage requirement in low traffic rural areas if tower
mounted low noise amplifiers are used on the base stations and no more than 10% of the
total power is allocated to the primary common pilot channel channel.




Dokumentnamn

Coverage Requirements for UMTS


Prepared
Per Wirdemark

Date Rev
2004-09-02

Document - Ref
PTS-ER-2004:32

Page
2 (18)

HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.



TABLE OF CONTENTS



1 SUMMARY.................................................................................................................................................. 1
2 TABLE OF CONTENTS............................................................................................................................ 2
3 INTRODUCTION....................................................................................................................................... 3
3.1 BACKGROUND ........................................................................................................................................... 3
3.2 PURPOSE.................................................................................................................................................... 3
3.3 RESERVATIONS.......................................................................................................................................... 3
4 LINK BUDGETS FOR UMTS................................................................................................................... 4
4.1 PURPOSE OF THE LINK BUDGET.................................................................................................................. 4
4.2 FUNDAMENTAL DIFFERENCE BETWEEN LINK BUDGETS FOR TDMA AND CDMA NETWORKS ................... 4
4.3 BASIC UPLINK POWER BUDGET .................................................................................................................. 5
4.4 FACTORS AFFECTING THE LINK BUDGET .................................................................................................... 6
4.5 CURRENT LICENSE REQUIREMENTS AND HOW IT RELATES TO THE LINK BUDGET ABOVE ........................ 14
5 COMMENTS ON OPERATOR PROPOSAL........................................................................................ 15
5.1 CHANGED SERVICE THRESHOLD .............................................................................................................. 15
5.2 CHANGED PROBABILITY .......................................................................................................................... 15
5.3 MEASUREMENTS ..................................................................................................................................... 16
6 IMPLICATIONS OF CHANGED REQUIREMENTS ......................................................................... 17
6.1 OPERATOR INVESTMENT ......................................................................................................................... 18
7 REFERENCES .......................................................................................................................................... 18



Dokumentnamn

Coverage Requirements for UMTS


Prepared
Per Wirdemark

Date Rev
2004-09-02

Document - Ref
PTS-ER-2004:32

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3 (18)

HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.

2 INTRODUCTION
2.1 Background

UMTS license conditions[1] in Sweden include a requirement on the operators to provide a
measured field strength on the primary common pilot channel of 58 dBuV / m with 95 %
area probability.

In a clarification to the signal strength requirement it is stated that it corresponds to service
bit rates between 144 and 384 kbit/s in an indoor environment.

2.2 Purpose
The purpose of this report is to find out how the signal requirement matches the service
requirement, and to comment on some of the specific issues raised by the operators[5].


2.3 Reservations

In order to calculate the required signal strengths for the different services and different
environment, a link budget is presented. Link budgets always makes a number of
assumptions, and engineers can gladly spend hours debating individual values. UMTS
technology is still not very mature, and some early assumptions may still prove wrong in the
real life.

In this report we have tried to use values that seem average in the literature, so that any
deviations in one value that an engineer will raise would hopefully equal out the claims for
changes of another value by another engineer. Still, one should regard the final figures with a
+/- 2dB uncertainty.






Dokumentnamn

Coverage Requirements for UMTS


Prepared
Per Wirdemark

Date Rev
2004-09-02

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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
3 LINK BUDGETS FOR UMTS
3.1 Purpose of the link budget


The purpose of the link budget is to calculate the maximum path loss allowed between the
base station and the mobile for a given service. The maximum path loss is then used to
choose antennas and configurations for the base stations, and for planning of output power
on the different channels of the base stations.

The maximum path loss determines the range of each base station and thus the base station
density, and number base stations required to cover a given area.

Another important purpose of the link budget is to balance the up and downlink. Very high
output power of the base station is of little use if the base station can not hear the mobile
station.

3.2 Fundamental difference between link budgets for TDMA and CDMA networks

In 2G TDMA networks, such as GSM, all radio resources on a given frequency are dedicated
to a certain mobile at any given point in time. It is thus fairly straight forward to calculate
any imbalances between up and downlink, and to make sure the link is balanced.

In CDMA systems on the other hand, base station output power is shared between all
connections on the base stations, so the amount of power available for a certain connection
will vary with load and positions of the connected mobiles. Since the same frequency is used
on all cells, the link budget also needs to include margins for the interference created by
other connections, both from the own cell and other cells. This interference is often treated as
an additional noise that is added to the thermal noise.

Load on the CDMA system may also be asymmetric, as some of the packet data services,
such as web browsing, will likely generate more downlink than uplink data.

In CDMA networks, the uplink is normally regarded as coverage limited, while the downlink
is interference limited as a result of the load on the network. The basis for this is that the
base station has typically 10-40 W (40-46 dBm) output power available, while the mobile
unit has 0.125-0.250 W (21-24 dBm).

This means that in low traffic situations, the uplink is the limiting link, while in high traffic
situations, downlink becomes the limiting link. This gets even more complicated when a
mobile is indoors, since penetration loss will also attenuate the interference on the downlink,
but not on the uplink.

Existing literature often ignores the downlink altogether when discussing the link budget for
planning purposes. In this report we will assume uplink being the limiting link for coverage
purpose, but also check that a sufficient interference margin is available on the downlink,
under the assumption that no more than a certain percentage of the power is allocated to a
single user.


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Coverage Requirements for UMTS


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Date Rev
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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
3.3 Basic uplink power budget


The following example link budget is taken from the book WCDMA for UMTS[2], page
158. This link budget is not directly applicable to the requirements in Sweden, but serves as
a starting point to explain the general maths of the link budget calculation, and establish a
baseline that is commonly available in the literature. Deviations from this link budget will be
explained throughout the report.

Transmitter (mobile)
Max mobile transmit power [w] [w] 0,25
As above in dBm [dbm] 24 a
Mobile Antenna Gain 2 b
Body Loss 0 c
EIRP [dBm] 26 d = a + b - c

Receiver (base station)
Thermal Noise Density -174 e
Base station receiver noise figure 5 f
Receiver noise density -169 g = e + f
Receive noise power -103,2 h = g + 10*log(3840000)
Interference margin 3 i
Receiver interference power -103,2
j = 10*log(10^((h+i)/10 -
10^(h/10))
Total effective noise + interference -100,2 k = 10*log(10^(h/10)+10^(j/10))
Processing Gain 14,3 l = 10*log(3840/144)
Required Eb / N0 1,5 m
Receive sensitivtity -112,9 n = m-l+k

Base station antenna gain 18 o
Cable loss in the base station 2 p
Fast fading margin 4 q
Max Path Loss 150,9 r = d - n + o - p - q

Coverage probability 80%
Log Normal fading constant 12
Propagation model exponent 3,52
Log Normal fading margin 4,2 s
Soft handover gain 2 t
Indoor Loss 15 u

Allowed propagation loss for cell
range 133,7 v = r - s + t - u


Already at this point it is important to point out that link budgets in literature normally
includes a margin for the log normal fading, which can be described statistically, to arrive
at a maximum path loss that can be used for radio planning purposes. When comparing the
above link budget with the license requirements, it is important to understand that the margin
for the statistical variation of the measured signal in the outdoor environment is already


Dokumentnamn

Coverage Requirements for UMTS


Prepared
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2004-09-02

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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
taken care of in the license conditions[1] (with 95 % area probability) , but that the
license condition indirectly also makes room for Building Penetration loss. Also, a coverage
probability of 80 % is widely regarded as a very low value.

Thus, the path loss to use when discussing the license conditions is to be found somewhere
between Max Path Loss and Allowed path loss for cell range.

Later we will split the link budget up to find the path losses that can be used in conjunction
with the license conditions.

It can also be noted that the above link budget assumes a data terminal with 24 dBm output
power, which is not readily available on the market. An antenna gain of 2 dB is also a very
optimistic value for a normal voice primarily handset.



3.4 Factors affecting the link budget
3.4.1 Services and service mix

A higher bit rate service requires a higher received power than a lower bitrate. This is
included in the processing gain, line l above. A higher bit rate service require a lower
E
b
/N
0
than a low bit rate service. This is due to a fixed amount of overhead for control
channels, regardless of the service bit rate. (A in detail description can be found in chapter
11.2.1.1 in [2]). The E
b
/N
0
values assumed normally includes the diversity gain, and thus the
required E
b
/N
0
is normally lower in the uplink than downlink.

License conditions in Sweden mention bit rates from 144-384 kbit/s indoors. In this report
we assume

- Minimum CS 128 on the uplink for good video quality or PS 144 for uploads.
- Minimum PS 384 on the downlink for fast web browsing and downloads

As uplink is normally the coverage limiting link, UL 144 kbit/s will be the dimensioning
criteria.



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Coverage Requirements for UMTS


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3.4.2 Building Penetration loss
Mobile phones and data terminals are used in a variety of environments, but to a very large
degree they are being used indoors, the signal thus being attenuated as it has to propagate
through the walls or windows of the building where the user is. The link budget needs to
include a margin for the penetration loss in case service is planned for indoor users.


Building attenuation varies greatly between buildings and is affected by

Building material
Wall thickness
The amount of windows
Presence of sun reflective shielding on windows
How deep into the building the user is
Whether the building itself has Line Of Sight (LOS) with the serving base station
Angle of incidence of the incoming signal
On which storey of a building the receiver is located


It is difficult to find any conclusive scientific research on this subject, results vary greatly
between different studies, and no research covers all aspects listed above.

The COST 231 final report [3] attempts to summarize all studies within its framework to 3
equations to be used in 3 different scenarios

1. micro cellular
2. macro cellular with line of sight between base station and building
3. macro cellular with non line of sight between base station and building

The third scenario seems most applicable when discussing signal strength on cell boundaries
where the license conditions apply. The formula in this case is:

L = L
outside
+ W
e
+ W
ge
+ a * d - G
fh


Where

L is the total path loss
L
Outside
is the path loss between the base station and a point at ground level just outside the
building
W
e
is the attenuation in the external wall
W
ge is
a compensation factor for non perpendicular radio wave arrival
D is the how far away from the wall a receiver is
A is a constant, 0.6 dB / m is recommended
G
fh
is the floor gain, i.e. the signal will normally be higher on higher floors

Recommended values are

We : 4-10 dB (4 dB for wood, 7 dB for concrete walls)
Wge : 3-5 dB at 900 MHz, 5-7 dB at 1800 MHz


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Coverage Requirements for UMTS


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HiQ Data AB
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It is evident that a single penetration loss value will not apply to all environments. A small
building normally has thinner walls than a large building. A small building also has windows
in different directions, thus giving a lower penetration loss. In Sweden single family house
are mainly constructed out of wood, while multi family and multistory buildings are
normally made of concrete. Even if not all single family houses are constructed of wood, one
should understand that the measurements conducted by COST members to arrive at a value
specific for wood, have been carried out in small buildings (since no large buildings are
made of wood). Hence, the wood value is to some extent applicable not only to wooden
buildings, but also to small buildings in general.

The following distinction is suggested:

1. Single family houses (treated as wood)
2. Radhus (treated as wood)
3. Houses with more than 2 storeys (concrete) with large separation (urban)
4. Houses with more than 2 storeys (concrete) with small separation (city, dense urban)

While all this is nice in theory, it must be possible to classify areas also in practice. Grna
Kartan has the following classifications that seems useful

Lg Bebyggelse (mainly single family houses, i.e. 1 and 2 above)
Hg bebyggelse (3 above)
Sluten bebyggelse (4 above)

In a smaller building a user is more likely to be close to an external wall than in a large
building. The following values are suggested based on the COST 231 formula above,
assuming values for the ground floor, i.e. Gfh = 0.

Class We
(dB)
Wge
(db)
D (m) Average Penetration
Loss
Standard Deviation
Lg Bebyggelse 4 5 3 11 dB 4
Hg bebyggelse 7 6 5 16 dB 6
Sluten bebyggelse 10 7 5 20 dB 8


Since the variation of the penetration loss is significant (> 1 dB), the variation needs to be
included and dealt with statistically. Standard deviation figures for the different building
types is not readily available from the COST report, but various other reports suggests values
in the range 4-8 dB.



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HiQ Data AB
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3.4.3 Traffic Load

Higher average traffic will result in higher noise rise on both up and downlink. On the uplink
it is suggested to use 1 dB (corresponding to 20 % cell load) noise rise for low traffic cells
(rural areas), and 3 dB noise rise (corresponding to 50 % cell load) for cells in more
populated environments (dense urban, urban, suburban). Values are taken from [2].

The noise rise on the downlink is not so straightforward to calculate. In the literature it can
be found to be modelled as a single value based on the results of some simulation, but in
reality it will depend on the receiver location in the cell, and whether the receiver is indoors
or not. Typically the noise rise is higher on the downlink than in the uplink, partly due to
asymmetric load, partly due to other spreading techniques. The link budgets in this report
calculates the path loss margin the downlink has over the uplink, i.e. how much noise rise
can be tolerated on the downlink, and draws some conclusions from this.
3.4.4 Use of TMA

Coverage in UMTS networks is largely considered to be uplink limited in low traffic
situations. The basis for this is that the base station has typically 10-20 W (40-43 dBm)
output power available, while the mobile unit has 0.125 W (21 dBm). Even when
considering the better Noise Factor of the base station (typically 4 dB compared to 7 dB in
the mobile) and the approximately 4-5 dB lower Eb/N0 required in the uplink due to antenna
diversity on the base station, downlink still has a 10-15 dB path loss advantage over the
uplink in a symmetrical service. In case of asymmetrical load (higher bitrates in the
downlink than in the uplink), the 10-15 dB advantage reduces to around 5-10 dB (assuming
384 kbits/s downlink and 128 kbit/s uplink).

Uplink coverage can be improved by introducing Tower Mounted Low Noise Amplifiers, i.e.
an amplifier directly after the antenna. The gain of this is that the feeder losses in the uplink
can be ignored (expect for a short jumper cable between the antenna and the amplifier), and
that the TMA often has a better Noise Factor (NF) than the base station (1.52 dB compared
to 4-5 dB).

TMA is widely used by the operators to improve coverage in rural areas.
3.4.5 Use of Boosters and high power amplifiers

As indicated before, coverage in UMTS networks is normally uplink limited. Introduction of
TMA can change this, which means higher output power from the base station than the
standard 10-20 W can be required.

Boosters and high power amplifiers are of course also a possible ways for the operators to
increase the pilot signal, but not always necessarily improving the coverage.


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Coverage Requirements for UMTS


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3.4.6 Service Probability

Radio signals fluctuates significantly when a receiver is moving around, even within a fairly
small area where the distance and angle to the base station remains fairly constant. Two
mechanisms are often used to physically describe what is happening

Large objects such as buildings and trees obstructing the signal. These variations are referred
to as shadow fading, lognormal fading or slow fading and occurs when a receiver moves
tens of metres.

All objects in the vicinity of a receiver cause reflections of the radio signal. In the receiver
these reflections will add to one another, with different phase as a result of different
propagation distances. This gives rise to fast fading or rayleigh fading.

When planning a network, margins need to be added for both these phenomena. The margin
for fast fading is especially important for slow moving mobiles, since they run a higher
probability of being still in a fading dip. An indoor user will of course always be slow
moving. The fast fading margin is found in row q in the link budget.

The margin for shadow fading, or lognormal fading margin on row s in the link budget
above, is already included in the license conditions (with 95% area probability), but
only for the outdoor scenario. When planning a cellular network, a planning margin for the
variation in the penetration loss is normally also added. As shown in section 4.2, a 95 %
requirement for the outdoor signal corresponds roughly to 90 % indoor probability, and
therefore no additional margin is added.

3.4.7 Soft handover gain

The soft handover feature in CDMA networks means a mobile on the border between two
cells will be connected two both, at each point in time using the best connection. When
planning a network this gives two benefits:

1. A mobile can always choose the strongest cell
2. Diversity effects since an additional antenna is receiving the signal


When planning a network, a statistical margin for fading is added. The mathematics of this
normally deals with one cell at a time, which could be OK for a 2G network, where a
handover to the stronger cell cannot not occur immediately. With soft handover, the mobile
will always be connected to the stronger cell, and a radio planner could calculate a little gain
in his calculations since the slow fading between the two cells is not 100 % correlated.
However, this gain is already taken care of by the license conditions and measurement
method, since that will always deal with the strongest cell.

The additional antenna gain from increasing the number of antennas is marginal except in
the case when path loss to both stations is exactly the same.

For these reasons, no soft handover gain is assumed in the link budget.


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3.4.8 Link budgets for typical environments

3.4.8.1 Classification of environments

Since the link budget will depend greatly on the building type and environment, the
following four typical environments have been defined:

Rural: Single family houses in rural low traffic / interference areas. To be low traffic, area
has to be a certain distance away from more densely populated areas, i.e. not being served by
a base station in the more densely populated area, or a basestation that is affected from
interference from the populated area. Coverage ranges is a couple of kilometres in suburban
areas, so a value of 3 km from the boundary of the populated area is suggested.

A suggestion on definition applicable in Sweden can be found in 5.2

If not classified as rural, areas should be classified as follows:

Suburban. Single family houses in suburban areas. Buildings primarily constructed out of
wood. lg bebyggelse according to Grna Kartan.

Urban: scattered multi-storey buildings with external walls of concrete or brick. Hg
bebyggelse according to Grna Kartan.

Dense Urban: buildings are built next to one another in blocks, separated by narrow (10-50
meter) streets. These areas are classified as sluten bebyggelse in Grna Kartan.


In the link budget below, numbers have been rearranged slightly compared to the basic link
budget above. The main purpose is to exclude the statistics that are already covered by the
licence conditions from the calculation, and include a downlink calculation to find the
limiting link.


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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
Dense Urban Suburban Rural Rural TMA Rural TMA
Service UL kbit/s 144 144 144 144 144 64
Service DL kbit/s 384 384 384 384 384 384
Transmitter
Max mobile transmit power dBm 21 21 21 21 21 21
Mobile Antenna Gain dBi 0 0 0 0 0 0
Body loss dB 0 0 0 0 0 0
EIRP dBm 21 21 21 21 21 21
UL Receiver
Thermal Noise dBm/Hz -174 -174 -174 -174 -174 -174
NF 4 4 4 4 2 2
Noise Density dBm/Hz -170,0 -170,0 -170,0 -170,0 -172,0 -172,0
Noise Power dBm -104,2 -104,2 -104,2 -104,2 -106,2 -106,2
Interference Margin dB 3 3 3 1 1 1
Receiver interference Power dBm -104,2 -104,2 -104,2 -110,0 -112,0 -112,0
noise + interference dBm -101,2 -101,2 -101,2 -103,2 -105,2 -105,2
Processing Gain dB 14,3 14,3 14,3 14,3 14,3 17,8
Required Eb/No dB 1,5 1,5 1,5 2 2 2
Receiver Sensitivity dBm -113,9 -113,9 -113,9 -115,4 -117,4 -120,9
Base station antenna gain dBi 18 18 18 18 18 18
Cable loss dB 4 4 4 4 1 1
Max Path Loss dB 148,9 148,9 148,9 150,4 155,4 158,9
Fast fading margin dB 4 4 4 4 4 4
Max Fading Path Loss dB 144,9 144,9 144,9 146,4 151,4 154,9
Average Penetration Loss dB 20 16 11 11 11 11
Max outdoor UL Path loss dB 124,9 128,9 133,9 135,4 140,4 143,9
Downlink
Transmitter total available Power dBm 43 43 43 43 43 43
Cable Loss dB 4 4 4 4 4 4
Antenna Gain dBi 18 18 18 18 18 18
Transmitter total ERP dBm 57 57 57 57 57 57
Max Service Power % 25% 25% 25% 50% 50% 50%
Max Service ERP 51,0 51,0 51,0 54,0 54,0 54,0
DL Receiver
NF 7 7 7 7 7 7
Noise density dBm / Hz -167,0 -167,0 -167,0 -167,0 -167,0 -167,0
Thermal Noise Power dBm -101,2 -101,2 -101,2 -101,2 -101,2 -101,2
Processing gain dB 10,0 10,0 10,0 10,0 10,0 10,0
Required Eb/No dB 6 6 6 6 6 6
RX sensitivity dBm -105,2 -105,2 -105,2 -105,2 -105,2 -105,2
Max DL Path loss dB 156,1 156,1 156,1 159,1 159,1 159,1
Fast Fading Margin dB 4 4 4 4 4 4
Average Penetration Loss dB 20 16 11 11 11 11
Max outdoor DL Pathloss dB 132,1 136,1 141,1 144,1 144,1 144,1
Limiting Link UL UL UL UL UL UL
Limiting PathLoss dB 124,9 128,9 133,9 135,4 140,4 143,9
Downlink Margin 7,2 7,2 7,2 8,7 3,7 0,2
Pilot Power % 10% 10% 10% 10% 10% 10%
Pilot ERP 47 47 47 47 47 47
Measured Outdoor Pilot dBm -77,9 -81,9 -86,9 -88,4 -93,4 -96,9
Measured Outdoor Pilot dBuV / m 65,1 61,1 56,1 54,6 49,6 46,1

The first part deals with the uplink calculation and follows the layout from the example in
the beginning of the report, ending with a maximum allowed path loss as far as uplink is
concerned.

Then follows a calculation of the maximum allowed path loss on the downlink, to make sure
we are not being downlink limited. First step is to decide the amount of power available for a
single user. The assumption is a maximum of 25 % for a single user in high traffic areas
(dense, urban, suburban), and up to 50 % in low traffic (rural areas).


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Then comes a calculation on the base station receiver sensitivity. An E
b
/N
0
value of 6 dB has
been assumed for all environments.

The maximum outdoor path loss has been calculated from a downlink point of view has been
calculated, without any margin taken for downlink interference and then the minimum of UL
and Dl path loss values. Next, the downlink over uplink margin has been calculated. This
value shows how much interference margin is allowed on the downlink.

As can be seen, the link budget is uplink limited in all environments, except for the 384/64
kbit/s with TMA example, which seems to be almost exactly in balance, i.e. there is no
margin at all for downlink interference. This example is not relevant for the license
conditions, but shown as an example when link is being, or close to being, downlink limited.

Before being able to calculate the minimum received pilot power, we need to decide the
amount of power set aside form the pilot channel. The pilot power is parameterized in the
base station and the operator can set virtually any value. In practice the range would be
limited. In the lower end it will be limited by two factors:

1.The pilot signal must be strong enough to be heard over the thermal noise by all mobiles
in the cell that are within uplink coverage range. This requirement means very little power is
required.

2. As the pilot signal is used for measurements of target cells before a handover can take
place, this means the pilot signal must be heard over the interference outside the own cell.

-100
-90
-80
-70
-60
-50
-40
-30
-20
-10
0
0 500 1000 1500 2000 2500 3000 3500 4000
Total Power Cell A
"Pilot Power Cell A"
"Total Power Cell B"



The figure above illustrates the received total power from two cells A and B and the received
pilot power from cell A. When a mobile is moving from cell B towards cell A it must
measure the signal strength on cell As pilot power some time before going into a soft


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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
handover with cell A. Typically, cell As pilot must be detected when cell B is 5 dB stronger,
in order to initiate a soft handover that will occur a little later.

The required E
b
/N
0
on the pilot on the downlink is approximately 10 dB. The processing gain
on the pilot is 10*log(3840 / 12.2) = 25 dB which means the minimum output power for the
pilot is approximately 5 + 10 25 = -10 dB (= 10 %) compared to the output power of cell
A and B. (This calculation is a little simplified. In reality interference is a sum of all signal
from all cells)

With a known percentage of the power set aside for the pilot power we can now calculate the
received pilot signal corresponding to the maximum uplink path loss.

It should be stressed that an operator can choose a higher value than 10 % of the total power
for the pilot. Literature often suggests value in the range 5-20 %. An increase in pilot power
over 10 % should affect the license requirement in direct proportion.

It will however be in the interest of the operator not to increase the pilot power
unnecessarily. Raising the pilot power will mean less power is available for services, and
increase the interference level, thus also increase the required power for the service bearers,
but as it is impossible to measure the amount of power set aside for the pilot, it may be very
tempting for the operators to boost the pilot power over 10 % in order to achieve coverage
according to the license conditions.


3.5 Current License Requirements and how it relates to the link budget above

As can be seen from the link budgets above, the existing license condition of 58 dBuV / m is
right between the values calculated in urban and suburban areas, if the operator is not using
TMA:s.

It is approximately 7 dB to low for dense city centres and approximately 8 dB too strict in a
rural environment, assuming operators are using TMA and 10% pilot power.



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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
4 COMMENTS ON OPERATOR PROPOSAL
4.1 Changed service threshold

The proposed received pilot power of 50 dBuV / m matches the calculated requirement very
well in low traffic rural areas, assuming operator are using TMA:s and a pilot power setting
of 10 %.

If 50 dBuV / m is to be accepted, it is proposed to do so only in a low traffic rural
environment, while maintaining the requirement in other areas, or apply the calculated
values for the other environments as well. This would mean increasing the signal strength
requirement in urban and dense urban areas. A proposal for definition of rural areas is found
in section 3.4.8.1

It is also proposed that the regulator requests information about TMA:s used pilot power
settings for all cells from the operators, and verify the assumptions in this report, before
changing the requirement. Information about TMA:s and pilotpower settings could be
requested on a per base station basis as part of the normal data reported by the operators.

4.2 Changed probability

Calculating the margins for a given area probability is standard procedure for most radio
planners. The maths required include translating the required area probability to the
corresponding probability at the cell border, and then under the assumption that signal
variations has a log normal distribution, applying the normsinv function to arrive at the
margin required for a certain required probability.

Assuming for a a rural environment, that signal propagates proportionally to -30log(d) and
fading has a standard deviation of 6 dB, 95 % area probability corresponds to cell edge
probability of 85 %, requiring a planning margin of 6.2 dB, while 90 % area probability
corresponds to 74 % cell border probability and a planning margin of 3.9 dB, i.e. a difference
in margin of 2.3 dB

Using the more common assumptions applicable for city environment, signal propagates
proportional to -35 log(d) and fading has a standard deviation of 8 dB. The required margins
from 95 and 90 % respectively is 8.7 and 5.5 dB, i.e. a difference in margin of 3.2 dB.

The difference of changing the area probability from 95 % to 90 % is the same as lowering
the signal strength requirement with approximately 2-3 dB, a little depending on the
environment.

When planning cellular networks, it is often the indoor probability that is targeted. When a
mobile is indoors, the building penetration loss will vary significantly depending on whether
a window is present in the direction to the base station or not. The normal way of dealing
with this is to combine the standard deviation for the slow fading and the building loss, i.e.

tot
=
fad
2
*
pen
2




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HiQ Data AB
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and then apply a margin to correspond to whatever percentage is required.

fad
normally varies between 6 dB (rural open areas) to 12 dB (cities, large buildings) while

pen
varies between 4 dB (small wooden houses) to 8 dB (large buildings).

In our rural environment the
fad
is approximately 6dB and
pen
is 4 dB. That gives
tot
= 7.2

The 95 % outdoor area probability will in this case correspond to 92 % indoor probability
(corrected for the average penetration loss) due to the higher to signal variation in the indoor
environment.

Changing the outdoor requirement to 90 % probability would mean indoor probability will
go down to approximately 87 %.

In order to achieve a 90 % indoor probability, outdoor probability needs to be around 93 %.
For this reason a change in the outdoor area probability requirementto 90 % is not supported.

4.3 Measurements

The operators have very briefly presented some measurements that they suggest prove their
point that 50 dBuV / m should be a relevant signal strength requirement. The exact point that
they want to make is not totally clear, except showing that it is possible to maintain a 64
kbit/s uplink at a measured cpich level of 36 dBuV / m (3 dB noise rise included). This
corresponds fairly well to the TMA link budget above if we correct for the following:

The link budget assumes 11 dB penetration loss (+11)
The link budget assumes 1 dB noise rise instead of 3 (-2)
The link budget assumes a 144 kbit / s instead of 64 (+3)

36 + 11 2 + 3 = 48 dBuV / m.

From the operators presentation of the measurement it is not clear exactly how the base
station was configured, but this information has been submitted later on condition parts of it
will be kept confidential. According to the information available and not under
confidentiality the basestation on which the measurement was conducted was not equipped
with TMA, which obviously makes the comparison with the TMA link budget invalid. What
is also surprising is that the base station seems downlink limited even when not equipped
with a TMA (downlink bit rate drops to 128 and 64 kbit /s at times, while uplink is not (?)
affected). With so little measurement data and background information, it is difficult to draw
any conclusions from the data presented.





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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
5 IMPLICATIONS OF CHANGED REQUIREMENTS

5.1 Definition of rural areas

By rural area we mean

1. Traffic / interference is low
2. Buildings are small, thus having low penetration loss and contributing little to shadow
fading

In Sweden the boundaries for ttort could be used to define populated versus rural areas.
The definition of ttort means that more than 200 people live in houses separated less than
200 meters. However, when looking at the smaller ttort, it is obvious that they do not
have any high buildings, or that 200 inhabitants will create any substantial load / interference
on the network.

A comparison between areas classified as high building by Grna Kartan and the list of
ttorter in Sweden shows that the number of inhabitants needs to be 1000-1500 before the
ttort shows any high buildings.

It is difficult to estimate the traffic that will be generated. In 2G networks each subscriber is
often assumed to generate 15-20 mErlang voice traffic in busy hour. Translated to a 3G
network this will correspond to:

1000-1500 people * 90 % penetration / 2 networks * 15-20 mErlang / sub * 12.2 kbit / s =
80-165 kbits/s,

which is fairly low, but not insignificant, load on a cell. Traffic can be expected to be higher
on a 3G network than 2G due to more advanced services. Simulations show that an uplink
load of approximately 300 kbits /s is shown to generate a noise rise of 1 dB [2], which is the
noise rise assumed in the link budget.

The increased interference level around the city will not be confined to the city itself, but
will affect areas served by base stations in the city. Range of city cells outside the city itself
is estimated to be a couple of kilometres.

Based on this it is suggested to define rural as areas outside a 3 km border around ttorter
with more than 1000 inhabitants.



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HiQ Data AB
Mster Samuelsgatan 17, Box 7421, 103 91 Stockholm. Tel 08-588 90 000, Fax 08-588 90 001.
5.2 Operator Infrastructure

Path loss in rural areas is approximately proportional to -30 log(d) in rural areas. This means a
reduction in the signal strength requirement with 8 dB, cell range increases with a factor 1,8.
Theoretically this would mean the number of base stations in rural areas required would be
1/1,8
2
= 31 % of the original numbers.

If a change in coverage requirements is confined to rural areas only, the calculated percentage
can not be applied to the whole country

There are 716 cities in Sweden with more than 1000 inhabitants (i.e. not classified as rural in
the assumptions), thus not being affected by a changed requirement in rural areas.

Without knowing how many base stations are planned in or around the 716 cities, it is difficult
to calculate the number of base stations saved by the operator if requirements changes. It
also depends on whether the operator has already planned and to some extent built for the
58dBuV / m requirement.

Given that many base stations already planned and built in some cities, and that the coverage
requirement may only change in rural areas, the saving in number of base stations will be
significantly less than the 69% indicated above, probably closer to 30-40%.

These numbers are based on very loose assumptions. To come to a better estimate, it is
proposed to make a tentative network plan with both original and changed requirements and
compare the two. Such a plan could be generated by a computer program, at least for
comparison purposes. Unfortunately that is outside the scope of this report.

The number of RNC:s will be affected but not to the same extent as the number of base
stations, since placing of these is done also to act as transmission network nodes. It may also
be difficult to change the planning of RNC:s at this point in time, since many RNC.s will
already be operational. The number of MSCs and GSN:s should be virtually unaffected by
changed requirements, since traffic is the major driver for the number of these elements.



6 REFERENCES
[1] Tillstndsgivningen fr UMTS I Sverige, 27 juni 2001
[2] WCDMA for UMTS. Harri Holma and Antii Toskal
[3] Chapter 4.6, COST 231 final report
[4] Microwave Mobile Communications, William C Jakes
[5] Anskan om Andrade tillstndsvillkor fr tillhandahllande av ntkapacitet fr mobile
rteletjnster av UMTS/IMT-2000 standard. PTS, Dnr 04-9599/10