Intelligent equipment can add capacity to networks

This intelligent and flexible new technology is still not commercialized, but it’s inevitably going to be part of our nearest future. The last years it has been attracting attention of researchers around the globe, including Telenor’s Per Hjalmar Lehne and Ole Grøndalen, who have recently been awarded the Best paper on “SDR’12 – WinnComm-Europe” conference in Brussels on this topic.

All radio equipment operates on certain frequencies – mobile networks, television, radio… To avoid interference, the distribution of frequencies is heavily regulated and the frequencies are distributed based on licenses. There are frequencies that are not granted to anyone – simply because they are still available, or because they are deliberately left as the belt, or zone between frequencies, ensuring that they don’t “touch”, and interfere.

Cognitive radio means more spectrum

The cognitive radio equipment is able to notice a frequency that is currently available and switch to it automatically. The use of cognitive equipment is thus both a technology and regulatory topic.
“Cognitive radio gives an opportunity to think about spectrum in a new way and ensure a better use of the existing frequencies,” Lehne says. This is certainly a hot topic, as the need for limited spectrum increases with the society’s need to be connected anytime, anywhere.

“Telenor is, like all operators, interested in getting more spectrum. In that sense, cognitive radio brings potential for our business. At the same time we shouldn’t forget that such an opportunistic access to spectrum would decrease the value of the existing licenses that Telenor pays for and it increases the competition, by enabling new competitors to easily get access to frequencies,” Lehne says, explaining the business opportunities and threats.

Part of the EU project QoSMOS

Lehne and Grøndalen have submitted their paper together with colleagues MacKenzie, Noguet and Berg, from BT (UK) and CEA (France). Together they are part of the EU financed project QoSMOS (Quality of Service and Mobility driven Cognitive radio systems). The project has been going on for more than two years and is about to end in December 2012. The aim was to explore possibilities and systems for use of cognitive radio, both on the technical and the commercial side. Telenor has been in charge for defining possible scenarios for use of cognitive radio, and will be involved in business model analysis and deployment guidelines.

Capacity reserve

USA has opened for opportunistic use of the parts of the TV spectrum that the TV network doesn’t use in an area due to interference problems that would otherwise occur (the so called “white space”). UK is about to do the same. At the same time, they defined technical limits for use of the white space to avoid disturbance.

“We started with the values defined in USA and explored possible scenarios – what we can reach based on those values and how we can use it,” says Grøndalen and explains that one of the possible scenarios is the so called cellular extension scenario.

“Let’s imagine the situation when the public traffic stops in the rush hour- you suddenly have a need for more capacity than normally. In that situation it is good to have extra capacity reserve,” Lehne adds.
In another scenario, cognitive radio could be used for wireless hot spots – to expand the capacity, when needed.

If everyone has free access to it, how can one be sure to get the reserve capacity when it’s needed?

“Obviously, many players will want to use the same capacity, so the number of those who can use it will have to be regulated, maybe through some kind of secondary licenses,” Grøndalen explains. “Or perhaps we will be able to buy extra capacity for two hours, in some kind of “free spectrum stock exchange”.

Inevitable and not that far future

The equipment exists, but it is not standardized for the commercial use in the network yet. The need for more spectrum is obviously present. USA and soon UK are already counting on cognitive radio in their spectrum policy and there is a momentum for this in EU. According to Grøndalen and Lehne, cognitive radio is inevitable future. In WiFI, where the use is simple, it could happen in a couple of years. For larger main stream use, it will take at least five years.

“We are preparing; exploring both the technology and the possible business models. We are making sketches for the possible cognitive radio future,” Lehne says.
Towards the end of 2012, Grøndalen and Lehne will be working on the possible business models with the colleagues from British Telecom, taking part in QoSMOS. Stay tuned to learn more about the possibilities of cognitive radio for Telenor and telecom industry as the project gets to its end.