The mobile sector must take the opportunity to create a harmonized LTE industry supporting both the TDD and FDD standards to take full advantage of the mobile broadband boom, a new report from Strategy Analytics argues.
With LTE establishing itself as the global 4G standard, the focus of LTE competition is moving from coverage to higher speeds and increased capacity, the report states.
Operators are using new spectrum bands to deploy additional LTE carrier channels and refarming existing spectrum. The 3.5-GHz band in particular is emerging as a good candidate for adding TD-LTE to existing LTE services.
While TD-LTE is making inroads worldwide, the global TDD ecosystem does not yet match that of FDD LTE. It will be up to the industry to develop commercial products that support both TDD and FDD to achieve global economies of scale.
“Sprint's Spark program is the latest proof that LTE TDD offers an efficient solution for mobile operators to increase their broadband capacity using higher frequency bands, while refarming lower frequencies with LTE FDD to provide good coverage and spectral efficiency,” Strategy Analytics senior analyst for wireless networks and platforms Guang Yang said.
"Hybrid LTE FDD and TDD networks deployed in multiple frequency bands can help operators rapidly achieve a good balance between network coverage and capacity. For operators with more limited access to paired spectrum, TDD provides a good option to deploy 4G LTE while still leveraging common LTE networking equipment and devices, as long as deployment bands are globally or at least regionally harmonized."