Base Station Antenna considerations for 5G · U900 L1800 4T4R U2100 L2600 4T4R NR700 4T4R L800 4T4R...

18th September 2018David Barker CTO

Base Station Antenna considerations for 5G

Copyright © 2018 Quintel.

All rights reserved. 2

Where we started from (2005)

3’s Base Station

Vodafone’s

Base

Station

Quintel

Combiner

Base Unit

O2

Cabinet

Quintel

Antennas

QinetiQ company era.

- 5x3G Ops in 1xAntenna

- Ind. Tilt per Operator

- Large Combiner Unit, but…

- Avoided site redevelopment

-Disruptive idea but very complex

Business Model.

-We don’t do these anymore

-Very different company

-We value these early years

and customers



Where we are today

Independent Tilt per Band

Maximum Service Optimization

Optimized

SPR & C/I

Best

Quality

Smallest Form Factor /

Lowest Wind-loading

• Base Station Antenna Supplier to T1 US Operators

• HQ in Rochester, NY, USA

• R&D in San Jose, CA

• Acquired by/merged with Cirtek – Aug 2017

• 17K Antennas 2017. 50% Growth YoY since 2013.

• Always adding innovation to our products

• Design for Manufacture and Deployment

• Thought leadership and value-add consulting

Leaders in High-Value, Multiport Antennas

6 Ports 12 Ports8 Ports 10 Ports 45 Deg HBW



Antennas K, H,& M

Worst Interference

Antenna P

Best Interference

Suppression

Antenna F

Best Coverage

Antenna J

Worst Coverage

T1 Operators Have Verified Quintel’s

Antenna Performance

Comparison of 13 Vendors

8’

6’

8’

6’

8’

8’

6’

6’

8’

6’

8’

6’

8’

8’

6’

8’

6’

8’

8’

6’

6’

8’

6’

8’

6’

8’

Be

tte

r In

terf

ere

nc

e S

up

pre

ss

ion

Better In-Cell Coverage (Gain)

Optimized for Radiation Patterns

Best performing

antennas are

Quintel (8ft & 6ft)

Poorest

performing

antennas

are from

Vendors H,

K and M

Best performing

antennas are

toward upper right

Overlap regions

causes reduced C/I

Vendor M

C/I

25dB

-1dB

>30% Capacity Increase on Average



Innovation for Deployment

Optimized Wind

Loading

Antennas have a

profile designed to

minimize drag.

Simulations and now

wind tunnel tests have

demonstrated this

Highly Optimized Frontal Wind Loading

Hurricane Maria, Puerto Rico

Our Antennas held out exceptionally well.

Credit to Mounts, Brackets, Integrity and Wind-Load of Antennas.



A brief history of the Base Station Antenna

1986 1992 1998 2006 2012 2018

G900 G900 G900

G1800

G900

G1800

U2100 + RET

G900

U900

G1800

L1800

U2100

All RET

L800 2T2R

G900

U900

L1800 4T4R

U2100

L2600 4T4R

All RET



10-P

ort

US Operator Example

850

B5

• L700 and L850 4T4R

• L700 4T4R

• CDMA850

• L1900 4T4R

• L2100 4T4R

• L2100 4T4R (AWS3)

• 3x Positions

• As above, but also

• Independent Tilt for L700 & L850

• 5G/NR850 4T4R

• 5G mMIMO Antenna

– Re-farm 2GHz: 1900 or AWS

– Possible 3.7-4.2GHz

– Both 2GHz and 4GHz

• 3x Positions

6-P

ort

2018

2021

6-P

ort

6-P

ort

AWS3700/850

B13/B5

AWS1

B66

1900

B25

6-P

ort

700/850

B13/B5

AWS1

B66

1900

B25

AWS3

B66

NR

1900

Massiv

e M

IMO



nTnR

8T8R

Passive

16T16R

AAS

32T32R

AAS

64T64R

AAS

Mo

re c

om

ple

xity

Wid

er

Dis

trib

utio

n o

f U

E’s

in

Ele

va

tio

n P

lan

e



US Passive Small Cell Variants for 4G/5G



Small Cells

Operator owns everything

Operator owns siteOperator owns all hardware

Op leases site from CCI

Operator owns active hardware

Op leases site, Antenna and

Fiber from CCI

Each Operator owns active hardware

Each Op leases site, Antenna and Fiber from CCI

Operator Host

Only

Operator Host

Lease only

Neutral Host

Single OpNeutral Host

Multi-Operator

1 2 3 4



Antenna Category FragmentationP

as

siv

e

AA

S

Macro Cell

N/A

Pa

ss

ive

+ A

AS

Small Cell mmWave

Not considering Indoor DAS and Speciality Solutions (Multi-Sector, etc)

Multi-Band

Single-Band

Single-Band AAS

Multi-Band Passive

Open Interfaces, e-CPRI and ORAN vital for evolving eco-system



The Future of the Base Station Antenna in 5G

2018 2024 2030

L800 2T2R

G900

U900

L1800 4T4R

U2100

L2600 4T4R

NR700 4T4R

L800 4T4R

L900 4T4R

L1500 4T

L1800 4T4R

L2100 4T4R

L2600 4T4R

NR3500 16T16R

mMIMO

NR700 16T16R

NR800 16T16R

NR900 16T16R

L800 8T8R

NR1500 32T

NR1800 64T64R

NR2100 64T64R

NR2600 64T64R

L1800 16T16R

NR3500 64T64R

mMIMO

• Continued innovation and development for

Passive Antennas for next few years

• Complex multi-array environments

– Many challenges

– PIM, Isolation, beam integrity

– Size, weight, wind-load

• Massive MIMO AAS predominately Single

Band (2300, 2600, 3500). AAS needs to meet

TCO targets.

• Evolution to 2030 takes us to using all of the

aperture for all of the bands

• In 2030 there still could be a need for hybrid

Passive and AAS arrays

• Will Open RAN interfaces prevail? Will OEM’s

take over the antenna function. New players

(e.g. Blue Danube), New partnerships?



Some Market Predictions

Source: Mobile Experts

CBRS Small Cell Growth

IA/AAS Penetration

Source: ABI Research

MIMO Installed by Platform



Annual Antenna capex



Antenna Design Innovations Optimized Rooftop Antenna

No Rooftop Diffraction

With Rooftop Diffraction Conventional

Antenna

Optimal for

Rooftop



PIM Interference Engineering

Bidding for Optimal new spectrum

blocks

Identifying Optimal RF combining

options (existing Spectrum)

Troubleshooting Interference issues

(existing Spectrum)

Quintel PIM Tool can be used for many applications; Strategic to

Tactical to Troubleshooting



Massive MIMO

• mmWave propagation needs classic beamforming for raw gain

and radio channel is more reflective rather than dispersive.

• Massive MIMO with TDD at sub 6GHz Spectrum allows higher

order MIMO to be much more efficiently exploited

• Massive MIMO can be one of various array structures or

distributed, or indeed a composite

Pre

codin

g

96

96

H1,1

H1,96

Massive MIMO for Next Generation

Wireless Systems; IEEE Communications Magazine, Feb 2014

• Several 100’s Antennas MRC/MRT is best

• Many 10’s of Antennas ZF/MMSE is best



MIMO TechniquesClassic Array with ZF Beamforming

Example above illustrates that data intended for one User can be precoded such that

9 Nulls can also be created where the other (co-channel) users are.

Tx

Precoding

for UE1

means

UE2-UE10

will be in

deep nulls

Tx

Precoding

for UE2

means

UE1,3-UE10

will be in

deep nulls

-50dBm

-100dBm



0

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

11

12

13

14

15

-10-9 -8 -7 -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

MIMO TechniquesDistributed Massive MIMO – 5.5G?

Tx

Precoding

for UE1

means

UE2-UE10

will be in

deep nulls

-50dBm

-100dBm

5m2

Distributed Massive MIMO produces highly interferometric radiation patterns.

ZF Beamforming would also ensure UE’s are in nulls.



How cell optimization has evolved

Inter-cell Interference Increases

2004 2016 2022 2028

SON

ICICeICIC

CoMPMove to LTE

C-RAN

Exploiting Inter-cell Interference

25dB

-5dB

C/I

2010

Inter-cell Interference Minimized

Radio

Planning

Tilt

Settings

ACP

As more cells are added, more

interference seen (sub-6GHz)

C-RAN architecture provides a

means of interference

suppression or coherent signal

addition; the notion of the cell

blurs or even disappears.

C-RAN needs significant

fronthaul capacity



When wireless is pushed to the limitthe answer isn’t more of the same

The answer is

more innovation

Base Station Antenna considerations for 5G · U900 L1800 4T4R U2100 L2600 4T4R NR700 4T4R L800 4T4R...

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