Mobile World Congress Topped 93,000 Attendees

This week's Mobile World Congress in Barcelona set a new attendance record for the event -- over 93,000 attendees from 200 countries.

The 2015 Mobile World Congress featured more than 2,000 exhibiting companies across 100,000 net square metres of exhibition and hospitality space. More than 3,800 international media and industry analysts attended the event.

“As we celebrate the 10th anniversary of Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, we are gratified by the record-breaking success we’ve seen this year,” said John Hoffman, CEO, GSMA Ltd.

http://www.gsma.com/

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Qualcomm Adds LTE modes to Snapdragon Automotive Set

Qualcomm has added two LTE modems to its Snapdragon Automotive Solutions portfolio.

The Snapdragon X12 LTE modem (9x40) is designed to enable auto manufacturers to develop next-generation systems with advanced telematics and connected infotainment features while supporting greater coverage at download speeds up to Category 10 (up to 450 Mbps in the downlink and 100 Mbps in the uplink). The Snapdragon X5 LTE modem (9x28) is designed to enable automakers to broadly deploy LTE in all cars at download speeds up to Category 4 (up to 150 Mbps in the downlink and 50 Mbps in the uplink).

In addition to LTE, both modems support all major 3G/2G cellular standards and offer on-chip integration of global position (GNSS) support for all major constellation.  They also feature a 1 GHz processor with Linux and built-in software for key global regulatory mandates like EU eCall and ERA Glonass. They can be matched with a companion Qualcomm VIVE QCA65x4 chipset with Wi-Fi/BT to support consumer features like Wi-Fi 802.11ac hotspots and safety applications like vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) and vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) with a seamless combination of Wi-Fi, DSRC and LTE.

“The effect of LTE on connected telematics and infotainment inside the car is transformational, rivaling the one from feature phones to smartphones,” added Singh. “Ubiquitous connectivity to cars is enabling industries like automotive, wireless operators, and insurance to come together in unlocking value for consumers. In addition, the cars of tomorrow will not only inform and entertain the consumer, but also communicate with their environment to make driving safer, which is accomplished through system level integration across infotainment, telematics and connectivity subsystems of the vehicle. The X12 and X5 are designed with this integration as a requirement, so we can support the vision of getting these capabilities into all cars.”


http://www.qualcomm.com

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Marvell Unveils 5-mode 4G LTE Release 10 Modem

Marvell unveiled a 5-mode 4G LTE Release 10 modem chipset supporting Carrier Aggregation.

The Marvell ARMADA Mobile PXA1826 extends the company's leadership in 64-bit quad-core and octa-core 4G LTE mobile processors for global markets.

Key features include:

• Multi-mode LTE R10 CAT7 supporting TD-LTE, FDD-LTE, TD-SCDMA, WCDMA and GSM
• Integrated Cortex A7, up to 1.2GHz
• Support CSFB and VoLTE voice services
• Includes Marvell’s LTE R10 RF transceiver

“I am very pleased to launch our industry-leading 5-mode 4G LTE Release 10 modem with carrier aggregation. Our leadership in 4G LTE technology and close collaboration with top global operators and tier-one OEMs have significantly accelerated the mass deployment of 4G LTE in China and around the world,” said Weili Dai, President and Co-Founder of Marvell. “Carrier aggregation is an important technology to increase capacity and enable new features in cellular communication.”

http://www.marvell.com/

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Intel Shows Low-Cost Atom Chipset, LTE-A Modem, Mobile Innovations

Intel unveiled several new mobile platforms at Mobile World Congress, including the company's new low-cost system-on-chip (SoC) for phones, phablets and tablets and a global LTE solution.

The Intel Atom x3 processor series (formerly code-named "SoFIA") is Intel's first integrated communications platform for entry and value devices.  It combines 64-bit multi-core Intel Atom processors together with 3G or 4G LTE connectivity.  The SoC combines the applications processor, image sensor processor, graphics, audio, connectivity and power management components in a single system chipset.

The rollout includes the Intel Atom x5 and x7 processor series (formally code-named "Cherry Trail") -- the first 14nm Intel Atom SoCs. These offer 64-bit support for Windows and Android, Intel Gen 8 graphics, and an option to pair with next-generation LTE Advanced connectivity.

Intel's third-generation LTE modem will support LTE Advanced Category 10 service. It offers 3x carrier aggregation and download speeds up to 450 Mbps. Intel also cited improvements in size and power efficiency.  At Mobile World Congress, the company also demonstrated a pre-5G concept system that combines LTE with 802.11ad to deliver speeds of more than 1 Gbps using Intel technology end-to-end.

Some other mobile innovations from Intel include "RealSense" depth sensing technology, wireless charging and "True Key" by Intel Security.

In addition, Intel highlighted joint efforts with Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson and Huawei to address the demand for new telecommunications, cloud and data center services, improve network efficiencies, and accelerate the industry's move toward a software-defined infrastructure.

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Deutsche Telekom and Microsoft Enter Partnership for Mobility and Cloud

Deutsche Telekom and Microsoft announced a broad, strategic partnership at Mobile World Congress. The companies agreed to expand the Microsoft ecosystem to new consumer and business customers. The partnership includes a joint international marketing campaign spanning advertising, sales support and training, custom application development, and experiential activities, tailored by market. As part of the deal DT will promote Microsoft Lumia smartphones and online services. Deutsche Telekom will be a Windows 10 launch partner.

"Deutsche Telekom has been a Microsoft device partner since the beginning. Its trusted brand and network excellence in Germany and across key European markets will be a strong force to jointly deliver Microsoft devices and services to more consumers and businesses throughout Europe," said Florian Seiche, vice president, Europe Region, Mobile Device Sales, Microsoft.

http://www.microsoft.com
htto://www.telekim.com

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Broadcom Innovation Powers KT 4G LTE Small Cell Deployments

KT has deployed small cells based on Broadcom's system-on-chip (SoC) devices to enhance its high speed 4G LTE wireless broadband services.


KT completed deployment and verification of its Broadcom-enabled small cells for commercial outdoor environments this quarter and plans to expand services to indoor residential locations in the second quarter of 2015.

"With growing requirements on voice and video media services, mobile subscribers now require better coverage and higher-capacity networks," said Mr. Sang-hoon Park, KT Corporation Vice President. "By integrating Broadcom's high-performance small cell SoCs into our overall 4G LTE deployment strategy, we can quickly and cost effectively address increasing capacity demands while optimizing spectral efficiency."

Broadcom’s chipset supports concurrent LTE in the Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) and Time Division Duplexing (TDD) modes as well as hosted Wi-Fi services.

http://www.broadcom.com

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Alcatel-Lucent Demos NFV-based Virtualized Radio Access Network

At this week’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Alcatel-Lucent is showcasing NFV-based virtualized radio access network technology in collaboration with Intel, China Mobile, and Telefónica.

Alcatel-Lucent said its vRAN solutions will be available for customer trials during 2015 and for commercial operation in 2016.  Over the past year, the company has announced the virtualization of a wide range of network functions, including evolved packet core, IMS, Content Delivery Network and service routing technologies. Its CloudBand NFV platform has been featured in over 30 customer projects and has an NFV ecosystem of over 60 members.

Alcatel-Lucent’s vRAN comprises a virtualized baseband unit (vBBU) that uses general purpose servers with Intel Xeon processors.

Alcatel-Lucent and China Mobile, which have a long-standing co-development agreement in place, are showing progress in the Cloud-RAN program.

Telefónica is also showing the Alcatel-Lucent vRAN solution on its booth as part as an ambitious example of an end-to-end fully virtualized network running at #MWC15.

“A virtualized RAN will allow operators to take a big step toward 5G and benefit from the advanced features and efficiencies enabled by LTE-A. By teaming on this technology, Alcatel-Lucent, Intel and China Mobile have been able to very quickly develop a comprehensive solution that will allow operators to evolve their networks more efficiently and effectively,” stated Glenn Booth Senior Vice President and General Manger of Alcatel-Lucent’s LTE Business Unit.

http://www.alcatel-lucent.com

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Alcatel-Lucent Pursues Wireless Unified Network Strategy

Alcatel-Lucent introduced a “Wireless Unified Networks” strategy which blends the upload and download capabilities of Wi-Fi and cellular technologies to enable higher capacity and give subscribers a more consistent and higher-quality mobile voice, data and video experience in high-traffic or low-signal locations.

As part of the new strategy, Alcatel-Lucent is introducing two separate capabilities: “Wi-Fi boost”, which uses cellular to enhance the performance of Wi-Fi networks; and “Cellular boost”, which uses unlicensed spectrum to enhance the performance of cellular. Combined, they maximize performance for subscribers across both access technologies.

Alcatel-Lucent’s Wi-Fi boost technology combines the downlink of Wi-Fi with the uplink of cellular. This capability requires an OS software update to existing user devices that are capable of both cellular and Wi-Fi transmission. It also requires software updates in the network to blend the Wi-Fi and cellular access networks into a unified network.  The company calculates that Wi-Fi boost can increase download speeds up to 70% and increase upload speeds by an order of magnitude or more (compared to standalone Wi-Fi at the cell edge), while also doubling the Wi-Fi range.  Commercial availability is expected in the second half of 2015.

Alcatel-Lucent will also add a cellular downlink to the Wi-Fi downlink of the Wi-Fi boost. This pre-standard LTE Wi-Fi Aggregation (LWA) implementation can more than double download speeds relative to standalone network capabilities.

Alcatel-Lucent’s Cellular boost leverages the unlicensed spectrum bands to enhance the capacity and performance of a cellular network. Plans include the introduction of new LTE-U and Licensed Assist Access (LAA) capable small cells.

“As an industry we have historically treated cellular and Wi-Fi as unique technologies. For example, the industry debates the merits of Voice/Data over Wi-Fi versus Voice/Data over LTE. From a consumer perspective, it should simply be Voice/Data over Wireless. With Wireless Unified Networks, we are excited to be taking the important steps to transform and greatly enhance the user’s wireless experience in the home, at work, and in dense venue networks by combining existing Wi-Fi and cellular networks into one high performance network,” stated Mike Schabel, Vice President of Small Cells in Alcatel-Lucent.

Alcatel-Lucent is also presenting its new multi-standard enterprise and residential small cells and compact metro cells at #MWC15. Other innovations on display include:

• CloudBand management system, providing a fully integrated solution that orchestrates infrastructure, applications, and network in a single virtualized NFV platform.
• Virtualized, massively scalable Mobile and Wi-Fi gateways, including enhanced evolved Packet Data Gateway (ePDG+) support and seamless concurrent use of cellular (licensed) and Wi-Fi (unlicensed) access connections to boost performance.
• Virtualized IMS solutions that deliver a scalable and seamless communications experience across different access networks and devices.
• Motive customer experience management and big network analytics that deliver a more consistent, high quality experience and provide insight into network, device and application performance across the network.

http://www.alcatel-lucent.com

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Advantech - #NFV Reaches the Tipping Point

http://youtu.be/CgOAsqEAs1w

NFV is a big theme at Mobile World Congress 2015.  Paul Stevens previews the latest from Advantech.

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#MWC15 - @Gigamon on De-risking VoLTE Deployments

http://youtu.be/_d__V6-aoGU

Lots of interest for VoLTE and Video-over-LTE at this year's Mobile World Congress. Andy Huckridge previews Gigamon's approach to de-risking deployments.

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#MWC 2015 - Unlocking the Value of Context with @SAP_Telco

http://youtu.be/eo1kbm-2XRo

The next trend in mobile transformation is unlocking the value of context by getting the right information to the right user at the right time, says Rick Costanzo, Exec. VP and GM, Telecommunication Industry & Global Mobility Solutions.

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Nokia Rolls Out Radio Enhancements

At this week’s Mobile World Congress, Nokia Networks is rolling out enhancements across its radio portfolio.  Some highlights:

• Extending the unique macro parity Small Cells offering with dual band LTE pico cells and a Flexi Zone 3G/Wi-Fi base station.
• Significant LTE-Advanced enhancements across all dimensions, with Carrier Aggregation launches for TDD-FDD, Small Cells and between sites.
• Capitalizing on new radio spectrum thanks to a new 8-pipe TD-LTE-Advanced 3.5GHz radio and future expansion to unlicensed bands with LTE-U technology; both demonstrated at MWC.
• Improving spectral efficiency with enhancements in both LTE- and TD-LTE-Advanced, including MIMO 4x4 and Downlink CoMP (Coordinated Multipoint).
• Single RAN Advanced portfolio now enables carbon neutral base station sites, with several launches including the launch of a new Radio Antenna System and advanced energy saving software .
• Consulting services to guide operators to the best and most cost efficient network evolution strategies, and a new Multi-layer Optimization service that can reduce unnecessary handovers by up to 20%.

“Operators are preparing for the huge data growth that is coming with 5G and ultra-dense networks. We help them plan ahead to evolve their networks, making the most of their existing equipment as well as deploying the newest technologies to provide a seamless experience for mobile users across all access technologies and network layers,” said Marc Rouanne,  Executive Vice President, Mobile Broadband at Nokia Networks.

http://networks.nokia.com/

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Juniper and Amdocs Showcase vCPE

At this week's Mobile World Congress, Juniper Networks and Amdocs will showcase an automated virtualized customer premises equipment (vCPE) solution that leverages Juniper's vMX router and vSRX firewall.The joint offering also utilizes Juniper's Contrail Networking framework.

The Amdocs Network Cloud Service Orchestrator allows provisioning and rapid fulfillment of both virtual and physical network functions services. As part of the joint offering, Juniper and Amdocs are also providing a user portal for self-service selection, a service catalog and service creation capability, and a wide range of delivery and managed services options to help service providers transition to an IT cloud operating model.

“Service providers recognize the business value of software-powered service chaining as they seek to make their networks more dynamic and better able to adapt to rapid change,” said Gabriel Brown, senior analyst at Heavy Reading. “Virtual CPE is one of the primary use-cases for NFV and there is clear evidence that service providers will invest in the technology if they have the software solutions they need to achieve true service agility.”

http://www.juniper.net
http://www.amdocs.com

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Procera #MWC15 - Virtualization, Performance, Subscriber Experience

http://youtu.be/M79Z3gd--dI

Virtualization is all theoretical until you can deliver performance. Jim Brear, CEO of Procera, highlights Mobile World Congress 2015, including a game changing performance benchmark achieved in partnership with Intel as well as an ETSI Proof-of-Concept demonstration.

http://youtu.be/SQ5BcNbStPE

"Enhancing the subscriber experience" is a big theme at this year's Mobile World Congress and the mission of Procera Networks. Jim Brear previews the upcoming week in Barcelona.

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SK Telecom Deploys LTE Small Cells with Carrier Aggregation

SK Telecom, Korea's largest telecommunications company, has selected Broadcom's latest small cell system-on-chip (SoC) devices with carrier aggregation technology to enhance its high-speed 4G LTE services.  SK Telecom aims to be the first carrier to deploy LTE small cells capable of aggregating two non-contiguous bands, thus increasing bandwidth and data throughout its LTE network.

"SK Telecom is making constant efforts to enhance our LTE network and offer a wider range of value added services to our mobile customers," said Park Jin-hyo, SK Telecom Senior Vice President and Head of the Network Technology R&D Center.  "As a result of Broadcom's superior capabilities in small cell chipset innovation, we can deliver the seamless mobile experience our subscribers have come to expect."

Broadcom’s BCM61765 SoC supports both inter-band and intra-band Carrier Aggregation services in both TD-LTE and FD-LTE concurrently.

http://www.broadcom.com

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Gigamon and Empirix Enable Data Filtering for Service Providers

Gigamon has teamed up with Empirix to extend the analytical capabilities of the Empirix IntelliSight customer experience and performance management platform.

The solution combines the advanced traffic intelligence of the Gigamon Visibility Fabric with the Empirix IntelliSight to transform volumes of data into real-time understanding of user experiences.

Empirix IntelliSight can ingest vast quantities of data leveraging intelligent optimization to better understand customer experience, application and performance management, as well as enhance the ability to make strategic business decisions.

"Carriers are constantly exploring new paths to monetization, and that journey begins with having clear insight into how their own infrastructure is being utilized by their subscribers," said Shehzad Merchant, Chief Technology Officer at Gigamon. "As the carrier infrastructure evolves to a converged 4G/LTE infrastructure with new applications running over that infrastructure, Gigamon's Visibility Fabric solutions provide pertinent, correlated, de-duplicated, and highly optimized traffic feeds to Empirix's IntelliSight platform. This provides carriers with a deeper insight into their infrastructure, which in turn results in the ability to pinpoint issues and resolve problems faster in order to meet service level agreements while also offering the ability to create new and innovative premium services."

http://www.gigamon.com
http://www.empirix.com

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TI Announces Ultra-low Power Wireless Platform

Texas Instruments introduced its new SimpleLink ultra-low power wireless microcontroller  platform for Bluetooth Smart, 6LoWPAN, ZigBee, Sub-1 GHz and ZigBee RF4CE aimed at new class of battery-less devices powered by energy-harvesting techniques or coin cell batteries.

The SimpleLink ultra-low power platform features an ARM Cortex-M3 MCU, Flash/RAM, analog-to-digital converter, peripherals, sensor controller and built-in robust security on chip. TI offers ready-to-use protocol stacks.

The new ultra-low power platform includes a unique integrated sensor controller that interfaces external sensors autonomously while the rest of the device sleeps. The platform includes radio peak currents below 6.2mA and MCU active current of less than 61uA/MHz. The complete chip can stay in standby at only 1 uA with memory retention and RTC (real time clock) running.

http://www.ti.com/simplelink

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Cavium Intros Chipesets for Next Gen Base Stations

Cavium introduced a family of chipsets designed for a new category of Macrocells and Smart Radio Heads with integrated Layer 1 functionality to enable seamless virtualization of the upper layers in a Cloud RAN deployment. The goal is to support macrocell BTS augmented with Cloud RAN for additional scalability and enterprise small cells for coverage and capacity.

Cavium said current the architecture of the macrocell BTS utilizes a combination of CPUs, DSPs, FPGAs and ASICs which significantly add to the latency, footprint, power consumption and cost. Its new OCTEON Fusion-M processors are single chip solutions for macro BTS and Smart Radio Heads that target next generation radio networks including 3GPP LTE Rel11/12. The key features include highly optimized full custom processor cores, a highly efficient caching subsystem, high memory bandwidth and a very flexible and high performance PHY. Cavium has a long history of delivering high-performance multi-core workload-optimized processors for networking, security and data plane processing applications through their highly successful OCTEON, OCTEON Fusion®, NITROX and Neuron Search processor families.

The CNF75xx family of processors is a full L1-L7 implementation supporting from high capacity picocells at 800 simultaneous users all the way up to multi sector macrocells with up to 3600 simultaneous users. Additionally, multiple OCTEON Fusion-M CNF75xx chips can be cascaded for even denser deployments or higher order MIMO. The CNF 75xx integrates highly optimized custom 64 bit MIPS cores and multiple VLIW DSP engines along with a host of hardware accelerators for the wireless modem pipeline, network processing and traffic shaping. This family is designed to allow system OEMs and operators to build next generation networks in both macrocell and Cloud RAN deployments while retaining the flexibility to evolve into the new 5G standard.

Some highlights:

• Highly integrated multi-protocol single chip 12 sector 24T24R MIMO with up to 16 cores running up to 2.0 GHz core frequency
• Simultaneous LTE. LTE-A (FDD/TDD) , HPSA+, GSM operation
• Supports a range of user counts from 800 user picocell configuration to 3,600 macrocell mode simultaneous active users
• The first commercially available 3GPP LTE Rel 11 capable (upgradable to Rel 12) SoC
• Highly configurable Wireless Baseband Module based on VLIW DSP cores, comprehensive PHY hardware accelerators, custom XBAR and PHY Shared memory
• Integrated I/O capacity including CPRI / JESD204B,10GE, SGMII, SRIO v2.1, PCIe v3.0
• Very high performance, low latency path for passing COMP data between multiple OCTEON Fusion-M devices

"Cavium has leveraged its multiple generations of world class IP to engineer OCTEON Fusion-M, a highly integrated family of wireless processors that provides a level of integration, performance and power/user unequaled in the industry. The OCTEON Fusion-M family are the most flexible processors for wireless communication and designed to not only encompass existing 3GPP standards but also new versions as they become ratified. They are ideally suited for HetNet applications and 5G roll outs," said Raj Singh, General Manager of Cavium's Wireless Broadband Group.

Sampling is expectec in Q3.

http://www.cavium.com

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#MWC15: Innovating with Hybrid Cloud OS - @Apcera

http://youtu.be/m0FST-mqHRg

Mobile World Congress will showcase lots of innovation in radio access technologies, says Derek Collison, founder and CEO of Apcera. But once the flood of data arrives on the network, how do you trust it and how do you know which clouds services can tap into it. Apcera is introducing its Hybrid Cloud Operating System as a trusted platform to run anywhere.

 

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Huawei Sees 4.5G Technology Delivering 1 Gbps Rates

Huawei outlined its vision of a 4.5G “business blueprint" for mobile operators that it sees as an intermediate step for LTE on the road to 5G.

In a briefing held a week before Mobile World Congress, Huawei said 4.5G will help stimulate the increasing popularity of many technologies such as mobile virtual reality glasses, smart metering and drones.  Some observations from Huawei:

• 4.5G can deliver up to 1Gbps bandwidth on mobile networks, making mobile virtual reality possible and this immersive experience available everywhere. Virtual reality glasses provide an immersive HD experience, but the bandwidth requirement can be as high as 1Gbps, 4.5G will be capable of meeting this requirement.
  
• 4.5G will make cellular IoT a reality. Industry applications such as smart metering require low-power terminals and better network coverage. While LTE is mainly designed to handle smart phone capacity, which is unable to reach a large scale, 4.5G supports up to 100K per cell connections via LTE-M, 100 times that of 4G. LTE-M also provides better coverage (Receivers require just 1/100th of the signal of existing 2G system, 20dB Gain) using low-power terminals (10 year battery life).
  
• Industry 4.0 requires lower latency between command and execution. For example, the precision control of a drone requires at least a 20ms end-to-end latency. 4.5G as a key component of Industry 4.0 provides the capability of less than 10ms end-to-end latency, opening the door for large scale commercialization of real-time mobile applications.

"4.5G is a natural evolution of LTE, and supports new business opportunities and an improved user experience through enhancement of the mobile network‘s capacity and capability. This in turn will transition our industry into an all online world with ultra high speed massive connections and low latency, allowing all of us to be fully prepared for the large-scale arrival of applications for cellular IoT," stated Bob Cai, Vice President of Marketing, Huawei Wireless Network Product Line.

http://pr.huawei.com/en/news/hw-415269-4.5g.htm#.VO1dovm-2-0

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