Massive MIMO

Nokia Massive MIMO enables

5G-like user experiences

Executive Summary

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Focus on high spectral efficiency
Licensed spectrum, especially below 3.5 GHz, is a limited resource in a world of seemingly
unlimited demand for mobile broadband services. The need to improve spectral efficiency is
putting mobile broadband technology at the focal point of efforts to squeeze more capacity
from existing frequencies. Leading these developments is massive multiple input multiple
output (MIMO) technology, which is set to deliver a step-change in mobile broadband
performance.

Massive MIMO substantially increases spectral efficiency to boost capacity and coverage,
enabling operators to meet the needs of existing subscribers and helping them to win new
enterprise and public safety customers.

Often seen as a future technology to support 5G networks, Nokia is making massive MIMO
available for deployment with LTE. Using existing spectrum and base station sites, Nokia AirScale
massive MIMO Adaptive Antenna delivers far more capacity than conventional antennas and
radios.

Powered by AirScale, massive MIMO is a basic building block of Nokia 4.9G, which will take LTE
network performance to near 5G levels to ensure service continuity as 5G is rolled out. 4.9G is
also a viable technology for operators without the spectrum for early 5G deployment.

Many streams create large data flows

Massive MIMO extends conventional MIMO antenna technology used today. MIMO typically uses
two transmit and two receive antenna elements to run two parallel streams of data between the
base station and device, doubling the capacity. Massive MIMO goes further, using many
simultaneous transmit and receive streams controlled by advanced software to create much
higher network capacity.
AirScale massive MIMO Adaptive Antenna deploys 64 transmit and 64 receive streams to deliver
up to five times more network capacity and wider coverage. Massive MIMO also enhances
beamforming. 3D, or Full Dimension (FD), beamforming increases hotspot capacity and improves
indoor penetration, while also providing extended coverage. All of which means operators can
avoid the need for network densification involving the costly building of new base station sites.
In future 5G deployments, massive MIMO will enable new high frequency bands that typically
suffer high propagation path losses to deliver similar coverage as lower frequencies. Once again
the need to build many more new sites will be reduced.
AirScale Base Stations are 5G ready, deliver Single RAN for FDD and TDD, offer market-leading
throughput per system module, which handles baseband and control, and includes fronthaul and
backhaul interfaces. More baseband capacity can be implemented by simply chaining together
more system modules. Furthermore, AirScale Base Station can take advantage of additional
baseband capacity available from AirScale Cloud RAN for unlimited scalability.

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Massive MIMO achieves significantly increased throughput and capacity by using many
antenna elements to create simultaneous data streams to a large number of users

Powerful performance on the path to 5G

Yet operators do not need to wait for the deployment of 5G to take advantage of these
benefits. AirScale massive MIMO Adaptive Antenna with 3D beamforming works with existing
3GPP Release 9 devices on LTE TDD networks and with devices complying with 3GPP Release 13
devices on LTE FDD networks. No additional spectrum is needed and existing base station sites
can be used. All that’s needed is an upgrade of AirScale Radio Access and software for massive
MIMO.
AirScale massive MIMO Adaptive Antennas are the most compact available, include the radio and
are around half the height of conventional 8T8R LTE antennas. This simplifies deployment on
crowded sites and in dense urban areas, reduces wind loading and cuts the cost of installation.
And being part of the Nokia AirScale family, low energy consumption and operational costs are
assured.
Nokia AirScale MIMO and beamforming capabilities are based on decades of antenna
development by Nokia. Nokia Bell Labs invented massive MIMO that could deliver a system
efficiency of up to 4500 bps/Hz.
With massive MIMO, operators now have a powerful new tool to boost capacity using their
precious spectrum resources to meet the relentless growth in demand for mobile broadband.

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AirScale massive MIMO Antenna with 3D beamforming software has been shown to deliver upload
throughput gains of up to eight-fold compared to 8T8R antennas

Nokia has launched multiple hardware and software features for Massive MIMO. Hardware
features include: Nokia AirScale System Module, Nokia AirScale Massive MIMO Adaptive Antenna
with multiple variants for several bands including Band 38, 40, 41, and 42. Software features
include: Massive MIMO, MU-MIMO Massive MIMO, 16 Layer Massive MIMO, and Massive MIMO with
CA.

Massive MIMO proven in practice

Nokia and Sprint have jointly proven the benefits of massive MIMO, with Sprint becoming first
U.S. operator to demonstrate massive MIMO for TDD-LTE spectrum with 64T64R, for both
the downlink and uplink on an existing LTE frequency.

Using AirScale massive MIMO Adaptive Antenna and Nokia 3D Beamforming software, the
showcase delivered throughput gains of up to eight-fold in the uplink and five-fold on the
downlink. Eight commercially available devices operating on Sprint's 2.5 GHz TDD-LTE band
41 spectrum were used.

Find out more about Nokia Massive MIMO. Please see our website and contact your local Nokia
representative.

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trade names of their respective owners.

Nokia Oyj
Karaportti 3
FI-02610 Espoo
Finland
Tel. +358 (0) 10 44 88 000

Product code SR1801021430EN (January)

© Nokia 2018

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