Nokia today announced the availability of a software-based upgrade that will enable its 4G/LTE radios to be migrated seamlessly to 5G/NR. These features will have a high value to Nokia’s customers as they provide immediate support for approximately one million radios, reaching 3.1 million by the end of the year and over 5 million in 2021. By upgrading existing radio elements via software, Nokia is helping to streamline the process of refarming 4G/LTE spectrum into 5G/NR. The move will also support existing customers and the installed base by offering a seamless and cost-effective upgrade path to 5G/NR.
The ability to upgrade 4G/LTE radios via a software update will significantly smooth out the deployment of 5G/NR FDD, avoiding costly and disruptive site visits. Nokia has a vast customer base of 359 4G/LTE customers with deployed FDD RF units most of which are possible to upgrade. This will provide a new and smoother way for operators to build 5G/NR coverage in lower bands via spectrum refarming. Nokia’s 4G/LTE radios are market-leading and outperform all vendors according to independent testing.
Nokia also has Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) already in live networks covering 2G/GSM-3G/WCDMA-4G/LTE and recently introduced DSS for 4G/LTE-5G/NR. This capability completes a DSS solution, covering all access technologies and making the radio frequency refarming to 5G/NR a simple and efficient process. In a typical case DSS will be introduced to one or few 4G/LTE bands which are then combined with carrier aggregation between other bands running pure 4G/LTE or 5G/NR. Nokia has the market-leading DSS solution covering all radio access technologies from 2G/GSM to 5G/NR.
Nokia estimates that this solution will save the telecommunications industry potentially tens of billions of euros in site engineering and re-visit costs as communication service providers are able to upgrade their networks to 5G/NR on FDD with software.
