A conversation about densification and small cells with Nivi Thadasina, senior director of 5G and 4G engineering at Samsung Electronics America
The below is only a summary. Download a transcript of the complete interview and the full report “Massively densified networks. Why we need them and how we can build them.”
With most traffic generated by subscribers from indoor locations, Samsung has directed its focus on the indoor small cell market. Nivi Thadasina, senior director of “5G” and 4G engineering at Samsung Electronics America told us: “In 2007 the need was coverage. In-building was the challenge. The signal was not penetrating where it needed to. The immediate need from our customers was: ‘Hey. Can we get coverage in areas where it’s very hard to reach through micro cells?’ Coverage was the initial need. That eventually led to: ‘Now that we got the coverage, can we also look at capacity offload?’ Especially for users who are on the cell edge of the macro network – they are the ones who consume the most power and resources, from a macro standpoint. Our customers were looking at ‘OK. Can we use this product, this tool, to see whether we can also do a capacity offload?’ That was all part of the 3G.”
Indoor coverage and capacity benefit both the subscriber and the carrier. With indoor infrastructure, Nivi said, “we’ll get a better user experience. Not only can you get a better user experience, but with it, operators are getting an improvement in spectral efficiency. In the outer network macro cells, I’m able to squeeze more bits per hertz now that I am able to take those tough users who are on the cell edge, and can offer them coverage with the small cells.”
We further discussed the topic of densification during our recent webinar. Download the webinar.
