Relationship Between LTE Broadcast/eMBMS and Next Generation Broadcast Television

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON BROADCASTING, VOL. 60, NO. 2, JUNE 2014 185

Relationship Between LTE Broadcast/eMBMS and NextGeneration Broadcast Television

G. Kent Walker, Jun Wang, Charles Lo, Xiaoxia Zhang, and Gang Bao

Abstract—This paper discusses the relationship between long-termevolution evolved multimedia broadcast/multicast service and next gen-eration broadcast television. Many of the techniques that are well knownwithin one technology are applicable to the other. Potentially, both systemsmay benefit from the techniques applied in the other. Some examples areprovided and discussed. The implications for long-term spectrum plan-ning are considered. Some recommendations are made with respect toappropriate actions to maximize the efficiency of the respective systems.

Index Terms—Broadcast television, communications systems, LTE,eMBMS, LTE broadcast.

I. INTRODUCTION

THE deployment styles of Long Term Evolution (LTE) EnhancedMultimedia Broadcast/Multicast Service (eMBMS) or LTE

Broadcast and next generation broadcast television vary fairly dramat-ically. LTE is deployed as a low power, low tower system; whereasbroadcast television is predominately deployed as a high power, hightower system. Despite the infrastructure differences, there are certainaspects of LTE Broadcast / eMBMS and Digital Television (DTV)that are similar and from which each of the respective systems maygain benefit.

The increasing demand for more bandwidth for mobile broadbandhas created pressure on broadcast television with respect to spectrumallocation between traditional broadcast television and the mobilebroadband as practiced with LTE. This paper compares the technicalsimilarities and differences, while considering how spectrum mightbe beneficially shared between the two systems.

II. BACKGROUND ON LTE BROADCAST/EMBMS

A. Background and Origin of eMBMS

LTE Broadcast (eMBMS) is a Single Frequency Network (SFN)broadcast mode within LTE that was largely defined in 3GPP Release9 [1], although enhancements to certain aspects continue. Most com-mercial deployments of LTE are of 5, 10, or 20 MHz bandwidth.LTE Broadcast /eMBMS is supported for all defined bandwidths ofLTE. LTE Broadcast / eMBMS is available for all defined formats ofLTE, which include Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) and TimeDivision Duplexing (TDD).

LTE Broadcast / eMBMS as currently defined has transmissionmodes that support up to more than three bps/Hz physical layercapacity. LTE Broadcast / eMBMS physical layer has two definedlengths of cyclic prefix that correspond to 5 and 10 km respectively,which are appropriate to a low tower low power deployment style.The 10 km cyclic prefix being only defined for the dedicated carriertype.

Manuscript received September 6, 2013; revised January 5, 2014; acceptedJanuary 20, 2014. Date of current version June 4, 2014.

The authors are with Qualcomm Technologies Inc., San Diego, CA 92121USA (e-mail: [email protected]).

Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are availableonline at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org.

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TBC.2014.2317299

B. Deployment Styles for LTE Broadcast/eMBMS

The wireless network operators much prefer wider bandwidthdeployments as these are more efficient in terms of unicast round tripdelay, and achieved capacity. The capacity gains achieved by widerbandwidth are more than proportional to the increase in bandwidthgiven constant Equivalent Isotropic Radiated Power (EIRP) permegahertz (MHz). For unicast services this is achieved by servingindividual users, when their channel conditions are relatively favor-able for a given user. This result is at some level analogous to thebenefits achieved by statistically multiplexing a large number of videoservices in a single wideband broadcast multiplex. This specific ben-efit is understood within the context of 3GPP [2]. Release 10 enabledthe more effective use of variable bit rate video encoding, althoughfurther enhancements are possible.

Carrier Aggregation (CA) introduced in 3GPP Release 10 allowsa composite data stream to be carried over two separate RF bandallocations [3]. This increases the effective multiplex bandwidth,which further enables the benefits of wider bandwidth multiplexesfor unicast as previously discussed. CA may be used to flexibly increasethe total available downlink bandwidth of a nominally symmetricbandwidth FDD deployment. This is useful in the presence of ahigh proportion of video downlink traffic. See Fig. 1 below forrepresentative data on uplink vs. downlink traffic. This information isbased on median measurements of live networks. These results werepreviously presented by Qualcomm in “European Analyst Summit2010: A European Spectrum and Policy Roadmap to Enable Innovationand Growth of Mobile Broadband” at IC Europe 2010.

LTE is deployed with a spectral reuse of one. LTEBroadcast/eMBMS is currently defined with one by two SingleInput Multiple Output (SIMO) i.e., one effective transmit antenna,and two receive antennas [4]. Two by two MIMO is a possibleenhancement for LTE Broadcast / eMBMS, although simulationshave demonstrated that significant gain is only achievable for denseurban deployments, which is useful for unicast, but less so forbroadcast. All LTE devices support two antenna diversity reception.

As with many communications systems, the use of base station co-location is beneficial in maximizing system capacity [5]. The achievedbenefits are largely due to minimization of adjacent channel interfer-ence at the receiver. The near-far problem [6] is substantially reducedby making the signal strength of adjacent spectrum segments moresimilar at the input of the receiver.

C. Effective Utilization of LTE Broadcast/eMBMS

The use of LTE Broadcast/eMBMS is well justified from an effi-ciency perspective, when the concurrent consumption of a particularcontent item exceeds an average of 1 user per cell / sector for UHFdeployments. Fig. 2 below shows the relative capacity of differentmorphologies of a 5 MHz bandwidth LTE Broadcast / eMBMSdeployment as compared to the unicast capacity per user. Theseresults were generated based on so called proportional fair schedul-ing [7] for unicast. The unicast capacity is representative of the 50th

percentile unicast user, while the LTE Broadcast / eMBMS capacity

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186 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON BROADCASTING, VOL. 60, NO. 2, JUNE 2014

Fig. 1. Ratio of downlink/uplink loading.

Fig. 2. Unicast versus LTE broadcast capacity per user by morphology andoperating band.

shown is based on the 95th percentile user. The LTE Broadcast /eMBMS service in some respects is a higher quality of service. TheLTE Broadcast / eMBMS capacity simulation is based on the centercell out of a total of 57 cells / 19 sites of a constant morphologicaltype and dimension i.e., suburban.

This figure includes data for multiple use cases. The D1 modelis nominally an urban style deployment at 2 GHz. The D3 modelis more similar to suburban deployment, at 2 GHz. The penetrationloss for the D3 model (20 dB) is a bit higher than typical for asuburban morphology (11 dB). Other frequency results are designatedas “UHF” for 700 MHz and “850” for 850 MHz. The decreasedpath loss for UHF deployments as compared to 2 GHz significantlyreduces the threshold at which system capacity is increased due tothe use of LTE Broadcast / eMBMS. LTE eMBMS is more efficientthan unicast, when the number of users per cell is greater than thepoint where the solid unicast line intersects the corresponding dashedbroadcast line.

Unicast LTE transmission is 100% frequency reuse, so whileincreased path loss at higher frequencies lowers capacity, the co-channel interference is also reduced by the increased path loss.Conversely, lower frequencies have lower path loss, so greater co-channel unicast interference, but higher broadcast SFN gain, so LTEBroadcast / eMBMS is most effective in UHF spectrum.

Typical types of programming that are likely to exceed the oneuser per sector/cell threshold are live sports, live entertainment, andbreaking news. The potential capability of LTE Broadcast / eMBMSto convert a flood of unicast requests for a high attach rate event into

Fig. 3. Current and predicted mobile data traffic source: Cisco VNI: Globalmobile traffic forecast update, 2012–2017.

a single efficient broadcast stream has significant benefits for theoverall network capacity. LTE Broadcast / eMBMS has the potentialto prevent the network from having to block video when there is ahigh attach rate news or sports event.

Given the current trends in mobile broadband bandwidth utiliza-tion, enhancing overall network efficiency needs to be a primaryconcern. Fig. 3 above shows the projected growth of mobile broad-band traffic in future years. While LTE deployments could be asignificant beneficiary of the digital dividend, there are limits to theamount of bandwidth that can be dedicated to this purpose, and inany case the traffic growth is far exceeding the growth in availablespectrum.

III. MOBILE BROADBAND AND FIRST GENERATION DTV

A. Finding More Bandwidth for Mobile Broadband Within theContext of Existing First Generation DTV Deployments

When the topic of finding additional spectrum for the mobilebroadband is raised, there is always discussion of the UHF spectrumcurrently largely occupied by digital television. These discussionstypically focus on UHF DTV spectrum being reallocated to mobilebroadband. This section looks at potential means to increase aggre-gate service capacity of mobile broadband and DTV by sharingthe spectrum rather than more conventional reallocation. Ultimately,increasing the aggregate efficiency of both systems is the best solutioni.e., carrying more services in the available bandwidth.

B. Sharing Spectrum-Based on the Population Density

DTV is typically planned utilizing one of four frequency reuse.This is the result of the high tower deployment style and the typicaloperating C/N of approximately 16 dB for ATSC [8]. The resultingdeployment style is depicted in Fig. 4 below. The transmitters in agiven market for example B’ jam or partially jam the co-channelspectrum in the adjacent eight markets.

The typical frequency plan is dispersed i.e., the frequencies uti-lized within a market area are spread out across the entire band asdepicted in Fig. 5 below. The distribution of channel frequencies isnot necessarily uniform in frequency, as depicted in Fig. 5, but istypically widely spaced to minimize interference due to the potentialnear-far problem [6] at the DTV receiver input. Analog televisionplanning also included consideration of the image frequency of thefirst Intermediate Frequency (IF), so called taboo frequencies [9].Digital televisions have largely switched to zero or near zero IFreceiver structures [10], [11], so the taboo related restrictions havebeen dropped and DTV channel planning is far less restrictive thanwas practiced for analog [12].

The Out Of Band Energy (OOBE) of the broadcast transmitters andthe restrictions imposed on adjacent channel interference combine to

WALKER et al.: RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN LTE BROADCAST/EMBMS AND NEXT GENERATION BROADCAST TELEVISION 187

Fig. 4. Exemplary one in four market reuse in high power high tower DTVdeployment.

Fig. 5. Exemplary one of four frequency reuse.

Fig. 6. Impact of OOBE on spectrum reuse for mobile broadband.

make very little of the 75% nominally unoccupied spectrum poten-tially useful for the mobile broadband, as is depicted in Fig. 6,above.

If the DTV transmitters are organized into frequency groups orband segments and co-located on one or two sites within a marketarea, then there is some possibility of opening up significant band-width for mobile broadband applications, without the removal of anyDTV signals. Fig. 7 below illustrates how the grouping of signalsinto band segments opens up significant potentially useful spectrum.

Fig. 8 below shows how this band segment scheme might beaccomplished for the current North American frequency plan. Thisparticular example assumes that there are two DTV band segmentsper market, which allows for two transmitter sites within a given mar-ket. This exemplary plan ignores the reallocation of channels 14–20to public safety land mobile in certain areas.

While this scheme provides a significant improvement with respectto removing OOBE from potentially reusable spectrum, reorganiz-ing the frequency planning does nothing to mitigate the co-channelinterference from adjacent markets. In order to reduce the co-channelinterference, the frequency reuse must change from one of four to

Fig. 7. Use of band segments to enable spectrum reuse.

Fig. 8. North American frequency plan reorganized into band segments.

Fig. 9. Mixing high power and low power with per market band segments.

a frequency reuse of one, which requires a low power low towerdeployment style in the adjacent markets. There is substantial co-channel interference at the base station receiver, due to height of themobile broadband base station receiver and the height and power ofa co-channel DTV transmitter. It is ultimately far better to operateonly like networks co-channel [13].

As depicted above in left hand column of Fig. 9, the conversionof all available spectrum to low power low tower style deploymentrequires that the DTV content be carried in the low power low towernetwork. The spectral efficiency of LTE Broadcast / eMBMS is suffi-cient to potentially enable all the current DTV services to be carriedin about 25% of the total bandwidth. Realistically, given the require-ments for 100% spectral reuse the 2 bps/Hz may be the practical limitfor an LTE Broadcast network used for fixed DTV reception due toboundary conditions and in particular the front to back ratio of thereceiving roof top antenna. The use of roof top reception for LTEeMBMS requires a substantially longer cyclic prefix as compared tothat included in the current specification.

An interesting aspect of the LTE Broadcast / eMBMS approachis that the converted markets would require adapter boxes to supportthe existing digital televisions. As a new deployment, these adaptersmay incorporate the latest video and audio compression technologies.These newer video compression formats may be a factor of four moreefficient than the existing first generation DTV systems such as ATSCthat are potentially being upgraded [14]. This opens up the possi-bility of significantly greater service capacity in the same deployedbandwidth. As discussed above the use of wideband LTE Broadcast


TABLE ICOMPARISON OF UHF LTE BROADCAST / EMBMS AND BROADCAST

DTV TRANSMITTERS

TABLE IICOMPARISON OF UHF EMBMS AND BROADCAST DTV RECEPTION

LEVELS

/ eMBMS at a high enough spectral efficiency could allow effec-tive application of statistical multiplexing on even High DefinitionTeleVision (HDTV) signals, which is not currently possible in firstgeneration DTV systems.

C. LTE Broadcast/eMBMS Link Budget as Compared to DigitalTelevision

Tables I and II above provide a comparison of typical LTEBroadcast / eMBMS link budget parameters as compared to thoseof DTV. The nominal terminal configuration for DTV has a direc-tional outdoor roof mounted antenna at 10 or 9 m height. An LTEBroadcast / eMBMS device has omni-directional antennas at a 1.5mreceive height indoors. The consequences for the respective link bud-gets are fairly significant. Table II above summarizes a number of thesignificant differences.

Fig. 10 above depicts the consequences of the parameters inTables I and II on service area per transmit site. This particular figureassumes that the broadcast TV transmitter has 20dB more radiatedpower per MHz than the LTE Broadcast / eMBMS base station. Eachsystem has 10 dB of link margin provided for variation in log nor-mal shadowing. The ratio of DTV coverage area to LTE Broadcast /eMBMS coverage area is greater than 4000:1. Obviously, even withthe substantial efficiency gains provided by superior codecs the costper supported MHz for mobile LTE Broadcast / eMBMS is still dra-matically higher than that for first generation DTV broadcast. LTEBroadcast is not typically deployed in a manner that can supportmore than three bps/Hz to the edge of a DTV coverage area. TheLTE capacity deployed per morphology is generally related to thepopulation of users per cell of a specific morphology.

D. Summary DTV and LTE Broadcast / eMBMS Shared Spectrum

The wireless mobile operators are the obvious candidates to buildand operate lower power low tower networks, as this is their corebusiness. This seems a potentially appealing scenario, but it is fraught

Fig. 10. Comparison of service areas per transmitter.

with business complexity. Multiple markets must commit to the tran-sition from high power to low power and multiple broadcasters andwireless operators must agree to a quid pro quo of spectrum forcarriage, which must include complex negotiations with respect toQuality of Service (QOS) for the DTV content potentially carriedvia LTE Broadcast / eMBMS.

The existing high power high tower DTV networks could be selec-tively supplanted with low power low tower deployments to achievea substantial aggregate capacity increase, but the business complex-ity and deployment expense make this a dubious proposition. Thereare however some useful technical aspects to carry forward from thisdiscussion.

1) Co-locating high power broadcast transmitters and utilizingband segments per market rather than dispersed frequencyplanning is a beneficial technique.

2) Utilization of a wider band multiplexes can enhance the over-all efficiency see for effective statistical multiplex of HDTVstreams.

IV. MOBILE BROADBAND AND NEXT GENERATION DTV

A. Considering Next Generation Broadcast Television

The use of enhanced codecs and increased physical layer capacityare typically at the top of the agenda in the discussion of next gen-eration broadcast television systems. What other aspects should bepart of the discussion?

B. Eliminate Internal Guard Bands

Many broadcast TV systems utilize OFDM waveforms. Given thealready described benefits of transmitter co-location for the near-farproblem, it is potentially possible to eliminate the internal guardbands normally included in between the broadcast signals. WhenOFDM and transmitter co-location per market band segment areapplied, this is illustrated in Fig. 11 below.

Such a scheme achieves an additional 10% effective increase inbps/Hz spectral efficiency. The ISDB-T format [18] as utilized todaycontains no internal guard bands between its segments and utilizes so


Fig. 11. Eliminating internal guard bands.

Fig. 12. Statistical multiplexing across multiple RF allocations.

called segment decoding, which is a similar concept executed on anarrow band scale. DVB-T2 contains an extended carrier mode [19].

There could be some concern about the elimination of the guardbands between the per market segments, however at the edges ofa market the near-far problem is mitigated by relatively large dis-tance from all transmitters and the directional discrimination of thereceiving antenna front to back ratio. Under current planning meth-ods, sites at the edge of coverage require directional antenna in orderto achieve reception. Unifying all signals in a market on one sitepotentially allows for the elimination of an antenna rotor.

C. Statistical Multiplex the Maximum Possible Bandwidth

Bandwidth aggregation as discussed above for LTE offers thepotential to effectively achieve the efficiency benefits of statisticalmultiplexing across a wider bandwidth. Typically, it is assumed thatthe entire bandwidth must be accessed in order to accomplish thisbenefit. This need not be the case. The 3 × 5 MHz (15MHz) hypo-thetical waveform shown in Fig. 11 above may be decoded by a single5MHz receiver. Fig. 12 above depicts how this may be achieved.

As exemplified by services 6 and 11, any given service residesin a single 5MHz of bandwidth at any given instant in time. Theactual real time bandwidth of the receiver need only be 5MHz. TheMediaFLO system [20] utilized this sort of time division multiplexedreception of multiple band segments as part of its frequency hand offstrategy. The DVB-T2 specification describes methods to aggregatemultiple frequency segments to create broadband multiplexes.

D. What can be Accomplished by Next Generation DTV?

Table III below provides a comparison of what is possible in a nextgeneration broadcast television system, as compared to a first gen-eration DTV system [21]. When the impact of all potential benefits

TABLE IIICOMPARISON FIRST GENERATION AND NEXT GENERATION DTV

TABLE IVCOMPARISON OF FIRST GENERATION AND NEXT GENERATION DTV

are multiplied together, there is a substantial reduction in requiredbandwidth per service.

It is instructive to consider the available services per market ofthe current HDTV deployment style to that possible with next gen-eration DTV. Table IV above contains a comparison of hypotheticaldeployments of first generation and next generation HDTV based onthe efficiency gains shown in Table III. The allocated bandwidth permarket can be decreased by ∼75% while the total number of HDTVservices available may concurrently increase by 120%.

As described, it is possible to substantially expand service offer-ings while concurrently substantially reducing the required allocatedbandwidth of the DTV services. There is a potential cost saving inelectrical power per service that is roughly proportional to the reduc-tion in radiated bandwidth, assuming constant ERP per MHz andantenna gain in the respective systems.

V. LTE BROADCAST AND NEXT GENERATION PROTOCOL

STACKS

A. LTE Broadcast Protocol Stack

As depicted in Fig. 13 below, an LTE Broadcast / eMBMS deviceutilizes an Internet Protocol (IP) based stack. Key components thatdiffer from older broadcast IP stacks is the use of broadcast DynamicAdaptive Streaming over HTTP (DASH) [24]. The use of DASH inthe context of LTE Broadcast / eMBMS is further refined in 3GPPTS 26.247. This use of DASH is aligned with the increasing use ofHypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) for streaming of video and audioservices in the broader and largely unicast Internet. The principlebenefits of DASH in a unicast application include the superior perfor-mance of device side adaptive streaming, support of video streamingfrom conventional HTTP servers, transit of the majority of firewalls,and simple use and reuse of content in browser based applicationinterfaces.

The use of DASH for broadcast applications has its own set ofsignificant benefits. The storage and playback of ISO Base MediaFile Format (ISOBMFF) Segments is straightforward, as there is nofile generation or format changes required at the device. Ad insertionis similarly convenient, as all programming is organized into discrete


Fig. 13. LTE broadcast device stack.

Fig. 14. Hypothetical next generation DTV device stack.

Segments of known time duration. The use of unicast join and unicastto broadcast hand over is significantly simplified by aligning the timesegments and naming for the unicast and broadcast service compo-nents. The existing FLUTE based repair service may be used, as well.DASH ultimately is very convenient in the context of both real timeand non-real time services and its use simplifies the interoperation ofunicast and broadcast services.

B. Next Generation DTV Protocol Stack

Current DTV systems depend on long serving Moving PictureExpert Group 2 Transport Stream (MPEG2 TS). This to some degreeisolates DTV from the broader Internet, due to the differences in pro-tocols and methods. It is relatively straightforward to convert nextgeneration television to protocols that are closely aligned with theInternet and LTE Broadcast. While there are numerous systems thatencapsulated IP in MPEG2 TS or MPEG2 TS in IP, it is cleanerand more efficient to operate advanced systems as native IP. A hypo-thetical next generation DTV device side stack is shown in Fig. 14above. The similarity to LTE Broadcast / eMBMS is readily apparent,and potentially simplifies the addition of interactivity to conventionalDTV, as many of the required IP based tools already exist.

VI. RELATED NONTECHNICAL ASPECTS

A. Mobile Television

Typically, a discussion of mobile multimedia and televisionincludes a dedicated or derivative physical layer for mobile televi-sion. There are a couple of reasons that this topic is not includedhere.

The earlier discussion of link budget highlighted the very sig-nificant differences between fixed and mobile reception. A networkdesigned for fixed television reception has very restricted coveragearea for mobile reception. Building a fixed reception television broad-cast television network out to the mobile coverage requirement iseconomically impractical for the fixed terrestrial application. A rooftop reception broadcast television network deployment is not wellsuited or designed to support the mobile application.

The cost of an additional physical layer in a handset that isoften subsidized by the wireless operator is another significant issue.Wireless operators are highly reticent to add a feature to a device thatdoes not have a proven revenue stream attached to it. Mobile televi-sion to date as a dedicated broadcast service has a notably weak trackrecord with respect to revenue. While penetration rate has been a sub-stantial factor in the relative poor economic performance of mobileTV, LTE Broadcast / eMBMS has the potential to provide servicesto an LTE based device at an extremely low incremental cost andcomplexity.

Ultimately, broadcasters can obtain access to the mobile device byoffering services “over the top” via the Internet without incurring anyincremental expense in the device. If the content is sufficiently pop-ular, the wireless operator will be motivated to convert the servicesto LTE Broadcast / eMBMS to preserve capacity. As an alternative,the television broadcasters might consider a dedicated carrier LTEBroadcast / eMBMS network to carry mobile television.

B. Economics of Broadcast Television and Regulation

Many governments are facing fiscal duress, so converting broad-cast spectrum into revenue producing asset is a desirable prospect.Broadcasters are also under financial pressure due to ongoing erosionof advertising revenues. Increasing the per service spectral efficiencyof next generation broadcast television can reduce the broadcastoperational expenses and potentially free more spectrum for auction.

VII. RECOMMENDATIONS

A. Maximize Efficiency in Next Generation Standards

The respective efficiencies of LTE Broadcast / eMBMS and nextgeneration DTV need to be optimized in as many aspects, as pos-sible. To the degree that either is inefficient it ultimately hurts allstakeholders.A should do list for LTE Broadcast / eMBMS:

1) Maximize the efficiency of statistical multiplexing within LTEBroadcast / eMBMS, when it makes sense.

2) Utilize co-location to the maximum degree possible.3) Facilitate the ability of an LTE network to discern the need for

a unicast to broadcast transition and optimize the transition.4) Complete the current effort to define and implement car-

rier aggregation. Use of wider aggregate bandwidth makesstatistical multiplexing more efficient.

5) Adopt and utilize the most efficient codecs commerciallyavailable see High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) [25].

A should do list for next generation DTV:

1) Support the aggregation of the bandwidth in a given marketinto one or two band segments and co-locate the associatedtransmitters.

2) Use separate physical networks for fixed and mobile televi-sion, adopting physical layer(s) that are tailored to the specificapplications.

3) Align the IP protocol stacks of LTE Broadcast and next gener-ation DTV. So that DTV may utilize the broadest possible baseof developers and tools already available.


Fig. 15. Interim reorganization enabling long-term plan.

4) Utilize statistical multiplexing across multiple HD signalscarried in the wider multiplex(s) to maximize efficiency.

5) Eliminate the internal guard bands when the frequency segmentper market organization is implemented.

6) Consider reorganizing worldwide bands in integer 5MHz seg-ments, as mobile broadband formats are already doing.

7) Adopt and utilize the most efficient codecs commerciallyavailable.

There is considerable similarity in the actions needed for each therespective systems.

B. Consider the Final Spectrum Allocation in Developing anInterim Plan

Regulators worldwide are actively considering some near termor interim reorganization of UHF broadcast television to free someincremental bandwidth. These activities inevitably involve the reallo-cation of RF allocation frequencies and some level of dislocation.

If the long term plan is to adopt the beneficial aspects of per marketband segmentation and co-location, then the intermediate plan shouldassign the existing spectrum in the end game bands accordingly. Thispotentially allows the denser markets to convert to the next generationformat incrementally potentially via the use of adapter boxes. Thissort of scheme is depicted in Fig. 15, above.

The use of adapter boxes, while less than optimum from a deployedcost perspective, provide the potential to accelerate deployment ofnext generation television relative to what would be possible basedon the historically slow replacement rates for televisions, recentlyobserved to be 6 to 8 years [26]. The selective use of adapter boxesmay be utilized to free spectrum sooner in dense markets, where thedemand is greatest and the costs most justified.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

The authors would like to thank to M. Scipione, T. Stockhammer,M. Luby, B. Nelson, and D. Zeilingold for review and construc-tive criticism of this document. All individuals are employees orconsultants of Qualcomm Inc.

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G. Kent Walker received the B.E.E. and M.S.E.E.degrees and Certificate in acoustical engineeringat Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA,USA. He is a Vice President of Technology withQualcomm Technologies Inc., San Diego, CA, USA.In his current role, he provides technical lead-ership for the LTE Broadcast/eMBMS project atCorporate Research and Development. PreviousTechnical Leadership positions at Qualcomm haveincluded MediaFLO, and Digital Cinema projects.He has numerous granted and pending patents in the

areas of digital communications, digital audio, and image compression andtransmission. Products developed under his leadership include analog and dig-ital video satellite receivers, digital microwave radios, audio signal processors,digital satellite modems, video scrambling, access control, and digital cinemaequipment. Prior to Qualcomm, he has been with General Instrument, M/A-COM Linkabit, Scientific Atlanta, and Harris Corporation(s) and is a memberof SMPTE, AES, and IEEE.


Jun Wang received the B.S. degree in elec-trical and electronic engineering from TsinghuaUniversity, Beijing, China and the M.S. degree ininformation systems from the China Academy ofTelecommunication Research, Beijing, China. Sheis a Senior Director of Engineering with QualcommTechnologies Inc., San Diego, CA, USA. In her cur-rent role, she provides system leadership for the LTEBroadcast/eMBMS project at Corporate Researchand Development. Since 2007, she has led the designof eHRPD-LTE interworking and played a critical

role in helping the implementation. She has contributed to and led sys-tem design and standardizations of cdma2000 wireless IP packet network,cdma2000 and WLAN interworking, BCMCS, UMB network, 3GPP2 femtonetwork, and 3GPP2 Machine-to-Machine communication enhancement. In1995, she joined Qualcomm as a Senior Engineer and was a Key Person inthe system design and standardizations of IS-95-B and cdma2000 1x upperlayer signaling and was the lead system engineer supporting upper layer sig-naling protocol implementation. Prior to joining Qualcomm, she worked as asystem engineer at RITT of China’s MPT between 1989 and 1995.

Charles Lo received the B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineeringfrom Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, USA. He is a Principal Engineer withQualcomm Technologies Inc., San Diego, CA, USA. In his current role, he isengaged in various systems engineering Research and Development and stan-dardization activities on cellular and terrestrial broadcasting technologies. Hisprimary focus currently is on the service and applications layers of broad-cast systems including 3GPP MBMS, 3GPP2 BCMCS, ATSC mobile andnon-real-time delivery, and MediaFLO. He joined Qualcomm in 2003 andinitially participated in 3GPP2 architecture and services, and OMA Broadcaststandardization. Prior to joining Qualcomm, he worked for 10 year in networkand services development, and technology strategy at Vodafone and AirTouchCommunications. Prior to that, he was involved in fiber optic transmissionsystems research and development, and worked on the applications of ATMand SONET technologies at Bell Communications Research and AT&T BellLaboratories.

Xiaoxia Zhang received the B.S. and M.S. degrees from University of Scienceand Technology of China, Hefei, China, and the Ph.D degree from The OhioState University, Columbus, OH, USA, all in electrical engineering. She is aSenior Staff System Engineer with Qualcomm Technologies Inc., San Diego,CA, USA. She has contributed to standardizations and prototype of HSUPAand LTE. In her current role, she has primary responsibility for the phys-ical layer aspects of LTE Broadcast/eMBMS within Qualcomm CorporateResearch and Development.

Gang Bao received the B.S. degree from Huazhong University of Scienceand Technology, Wuhan, China, the M.S. degree from the Chinese Academyof Sciences, Beijing, China, and the Ph.D degree from University ofMassachusetts at Anherst, Amherst, MA, USA, all in electrical engineer-ing. He is a Staff Engineer with Qualcomm Technologies Inc., San Diego,CA, USA. He joined Qualcomm in 1994 and has worked on standardizationsof IS-95, cdma2000 EVDO, WCDMA, and LTE. He previously worked onGlobalstar system implementation. Prior to joining Qualcomm, he worked as aResearch Engineer at Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences,between 1987 and 1989.

Documents

Relationship Between LTE Broadcast/eMBMS and Next Generation Broadcast Television