How will 5G really work?

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ABSTRACT

This paper will explore the 5G solutions direction from the outside house in and inside house out perspectives, answering the following questions:

What services will emerge that are outside only, versus those that are inside only?
What happens in the hand over from one network to the next?
What architectures are emerging?
What solutions make sense to provide seamless connectivity?

This paper will review the use of Line-of-Sight (LOS) and Non-Line-of-Sight (NLOS) solutions as well as compare the sub 6 GHz versus millimetre wave 5G considerations. It will also explore the sensitive cost points of customer client equipment to support multiple 5G options – for both outside and inside while shedding a light on some of the key decisions ahead.

INTRODUCTION

5G Wireless Networks are being built to serve new applications. These applications must fund the development of the solutions and the infrastructure. There are four revenue or new business opportunities that will be called 5G Wireless for the rest of this paper.

Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) – The connection of wireless broadband to homes or other fixed location services. In the absence of mobile 5G services, 5G Wireless will lead with this one. The architecture trend for bringing Gbps speeds to consumers and enterprise is driving to smaller and smaller cell sites.
Massive outdoor and indoor Internet of Things (IoT) connectivity – Where everything gets connected. Narrowband IoT (NB-IOT) and existing Category M1 (CAT M1) LTE (Long Term Evolution) services will fill this growing area initially with the use of Embedded Sim (eSim) allowing economical ways for low bitrate devices to connect to low frequency LTE networks. This is already starting to appear even without the 3GPP Wireless standard being fully completed by leveraging technologies such as Long Range (LoRA) using unlicensed spectrum below 1 GHz and LTE-M. CAT M1 LTE is a low-power wide-area (LPWA) air interface that allows IoT and machine-to-machine (M2M) devices to connect with medium data rate requirements. LTE-M is the simplified industry term for the LTE-MTC LPWA technology standard published by 3GPP in the Release 13 specification.
High bandwidth and capacity mobile wireless – As the silicon technology evolves to shrink the user equipment/client side of the 5G connection, there will be increased burst and sustained speed applications to mobile devices. There is already progress in this direction on traditional LTE solutions using CAT 18 MIMO (Multiple-Input and Multiple-Output) solutions with the full 5G mobile ecosystem and handsets starting to emerge sometime after 2020.
Connected Car and Connected Augmented Reality (AR) – Vehicle to Vehicle (V2V) and Vehicle to Anything (V2X) will grow with Self Driving Car technology. The ability to support everyday life activities with AR overlay and to improve Infotainment for both mobile and fixed connections may also drive new applications as diverse as digital signage and hands free, eye glasses powered experiences.