Telecom network vendor Ericsson today said Vodafone Portugal will deploy the first FDD TDD Carrier Aggregation in a commercial network.
Vodafone will deploy Ericsson commercial software release 15B, supporting FDD TDD carrier aggregation in the same digital unit. It used Qualcomm Snapdragon 810 processor with X10 LTE in handset for measurement and testing.
This deployment will allow Vodafone to combine FDD and TDD LTE modes. Adding TDD to the already installed FDD network significantly enhances the total downlink data capacity and improves subscribers’ mobile broadband experience. In addition, FDD TDD carrier aggregation extends the app coverage of the TDD layer by up to 230 percent.
Ericsson’s Networks Software 15B release enables simultaneous operation of LTE FDD and TDD using only a software update to Ericsson baseband hardware already operating in the network.
“Combining TDD with low-band FDD spectrum will improve the high-band TDD coverage area, and the TDD spectrum will significantly improve the overall downlink throughput. With global availability of TDD spectrum, we regard FDD TDD carrier aggregation as a key technology to further improve user experience for customers,” said Per Narvinger, head of LTE, Ericsson.
Vodafone Portugal used 15 MHz of band 3 (FDD 1800) and 20 MHz of band 38 (TDD 2600). In live demos last year, Ericsson and Qualcomm Technologies achieved FDD TDD carrier aggregation on commercial hardware and software.
