Neutral Host Models in 4G &

5G Architecture
Dr. Wenbing Yao
VP, Business Development & Partnerships

Jan.14, 2019 | TechUK Neutral Host Conference, London

New Business Models
From MNO led to Neutral Host led Infrastructure-as-a-Service

Driver of Network Sharing

Release Share
Finance Investment
Pressure Risk

Considerations:
• Partners shall have common long term
network deployment strategy
• Partners shall compromise in site
solution
• Loss of site/network control may harm
long term development potential

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 2

GMBBF’18 Indoor Industry Trend
Transition from DAS to DIS; Sharing models are good business models

Phase 1
Phase 2
Phase 3
… All parties agree to accelerate DIS industry. Vote: Deployment Priority of 5G Indoor Networks

Topics : Focusing on the indoor network challenges and the trend in 5G era.
1. Transition from DAS to DIS is happening now. 2. Accelerate DIS industry
Top 3 consensus of Indoor Network:
1. Both operators and neutral hosts agree that sharing is a good business model to accelerate the indoor network deployment. And both parties
choose DIS as the sharing technology facing to 5G era.
2. More than 80% traffic occurs indoors. In terms of the peak data rate(4x4 MIMO supportable), capacity , frequency support, 5G evolution(Fiber
cable) , DIS is the only choice. Many operators have set transition their indoor networks to DIS as their strategy.
3. Comparing with outdoor experience, there is still a large gap indoors. People are looking for quality of 4G at the moment, while the solution
should be 5G ready.

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Two Business Sharing Models Help Accelerate Indoor
Network Deployment
Model 1: Lead operators & joint operators sharing Model 1 Case : MTR indoor network business model
HKT : The lead operator have advantages than others. - HKT as the lead operator, shared with other 3 operators
• The lead operator have the ownership, joint operator
will pay the O&M fee.
• Once you are the lead operator, you can determine the
future upgrade cost, and upgrade strategy.
• Business Model is very important in 5G era. DIS will
allow us more flexible in the business model. Henry Wong,
HKT CTO

Model 2: Neutral host builds networks, shares with operators

Stratto : Neural host partnership is win-win in medium
size indoor scenario
• Based on a long-term contract with the building owner
providing Infrastructure and connectivity as a service.
• The enterprises scenario is our first target market. The
neutral host partnership can reduce operators’ cost for
that scenarios.
• Considering CAPEX efficiency, DIS could help to Richard Bourne
shorten the TTM. Stratto, CEO

*Stratto: UK Neural host company

*Source: HKT Speech Material at DIS Roundtable

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Neutral Host + MNO (independent BBU) Networking
• NH has only OM data for its U2000.
… … pRRU • MNO has User plane and control plane for MNO’s S1 interface and OM
data for MNO’s U2000.

Neutral
Router SeGW Host
Note : Cable type
U2000
RHUB
Ethernet
Optic Fiber Neutral The data center infrastructure is
owned by 3 party vendor and
RF Cable Host shared with Stratto to support NBI (NH - MNO)
DCU U2000.
Hybrid Cable

FE/GE OM Link
NMS
Router SeGW
NodeB U2000
BTS

BBU from Huawei MNO

FE/GE S1 Core Controller

Other MNO MNO MNO OM Link

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 5

Network Sharing Type in 2/3/4G

Network Sharing Degree(Low -> High)

National Roaming MORAN MOCN GWCN MNVO

GGSN, HLR,
Service platform

VMSC/SGSN/ MME

BSC/RNC/eNodeB

Cell

1. EE UK 1. AIS & DTAC Thailand 1. PCCW & CSL HK 1. CUCC & Funtalk
2. O2 & Eplus Germany 2. Vodafone & O2 UK 2. Net4Mobility Sweden 2. Celcom & Smart
3. Smart & SUN 3. T-Mobile & Orange 3. Telus & Bell Canada 3. Vergin & one2one(UK)
Philippines…etc. Poland.

Operator 1’s Nodes/Resources Operator 2’s Nodes/Resources Shared Nodes & Resources

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 6

Network Sharing Architecture in 3G & 4G

f1 f2 f1 f1
f1 f2 f1 f1
f1 f2 f1 f1
f1 f1
f1 f1
f1 f1

MORAN: Multi Operator RAN Network MOCN: Multi Operator Core Network GWCN: GateWay Core Network

 Independent Spectrum  Shared Spectrum Resource  Shared Spectrum Resource

 Shared RAN Hardware  Shared RAN Hardware  Shared RAN Hardware
 Independent CN  Independent CN  Partly Shared CN(MME/SGSN)
 Shared OSS & Independent NMS  Shared OSS & Independent NMS  Shared OSS & Independent NMS
Defined in 3GPP TS 23.251

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 7

UE’s Accessing in Shared Network
Operator A
Shared RAN
MOCN
PLMN A

MME SGSN Shared

cell Operator A’s
Shared roaming UE
cell Operator A’s UE
Shared
PLMN B
cell
Operator B’s
MME SGSN
roaming UE
SIB with Multiple PLMN list
Operator B Operator B’s UE

Operator A
MORAN
Shared RAN
Cell A PLMN A
Operator A’s
MME SGSN Cell A roaming UE
Operator A’s UE
Cell A

Cell B
PLMN B Operator B’s
MME SGSN Cell B
roaming UE
Cell B
Operator B Operator B’s UE

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 8

Fairness & Flexibility is the Key to Shared Network

Resource sharing Flexible

fairness independency
 Radio Resource fairness  Independent QoS Strategy
 Capacity resources sharing  Flexible transmission
 Roaming user fairness deployment scheme

Scalable Capacity Statistic by usage

Fairness
 Large capacity BTS &  Independent license control
 Wide RF bandwidth  Independent PM guarantee
 High output power Flexibility the resource usage
visualization

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 9

LampSite Sharing: Digital IBS for Multi-operator

Passive DAS: Analog Active DAS: Semi-digitalization LampSite Sharing: Digitalization

Digital Headend

Coupler
RU
ROF

RF cable Antenna
Fiber

Power splitter
i-POI & DCU3911
Signal Transformation

RF cable

…
Signal Source Signal Source
Separated BBU for each MNO

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LampSite Sharing Network Topology for Multiple Operators

Mode3: Enhanced Operator Host Sharing

Operator A
pRRU
BSC Operator A(G)

RHUB

Operator B(G) 10km

Operator B
BSC
DCU
Operator C(GUL)

Operator C
BSC/RNC/EPC
Operator B(UL)
BBU
Operator A(UL)

Operator A Operator B
RNC/EPC RNC/EPC

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 11

LampSite Sharing Hybrid Network Topology
… … pRRU hRRU …

Low power High power Antenna

Leakage Cable

DCU

Note : Cable type

Ethernet
BTS BTS BTS
Optic Fiber
BBU from Huawei
RF Cable
Operator A(G) Operator B(GUL) Operator C(GUL) Operator A(UL) Operator D(UL)

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 12

SingleDAS Solution Evolved to LampSite Sharing (High Power)
Solution
SingleDAS Architecture LampSite High Power Architecture

DRH
hRRU
Antenna Antenna
Leakage Cable Leakage Cable
Operator A(GUL)
Operator A(G)

Optic Fiber OpticFiber

Operator B(GUL) Evolution Operator B(GUL)

Operator C(GUL) DCU DCU

Operator C(GUL)
DCU3900/3910 DCU3911

U2000
U2000
BBU
Operator A(UL)

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 13

LampSite Support Smooth Evolution to 5G Indoor

pRRU5913 pRRU pRRU5913 5G NR 1

sub3G pRRU59xx 5G Evolution
900M (IBW 35M)
1.8G (IBW 75M) 1. Overlay C-Band pRRU
2.1G (IBW 60M) 2
2.6G (IBW 70M) 3 2. Reuse reserved cables
3. Overlay or replace RHUB
RHUB RHUB59xx 4. Reuse DCU, adding new
RHUB3910 Reserved Cable RHUB3910
board
2 5. Reuse BBU, adding 5G
BB board(TBD)

DCU DCU 4

RF Baseband
5
… …

operator D operator B operator A operator D operator B operator A

BTS/RRU BTS/RRU BBU BBU BBU
BBU

HUAWEI TECHNOLOGIES CO., LTD. Page 14

Network Sharing Type in 5G

Network Sharing Degree (Low -> High)

Roaming MORAN MOCN GWCN MVNO

Service Platform

Core

eNodeB/gNodeB

Spectrum

1. AIS & DTAC Thailand 1. HKT & 3HK

2. Vodafone & O2 UK 2. Net4Mobility Sweden
3. T-Mobile & Orange Poland. 3. Telus & Bell Canada

Operator 1’s Nodes/Resources Operator 2’s Nodes/Resources Shared Nodes & Resources
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5G Infrastructure’s TCO Split and Trade-off
Financial Benefit (from low -> high)

Site Sharing 5G-NR Sharing (including different NR architecture: e.g. Op.3X, Op.2)

Complexity (from low -> high)

Same Vendor Diff. Vendor
5G-NR + LTE Sharing 5G-NR + LTE Sharing

5G NR (gNB) 5G NR (gNB) 5G NR (gNB) 5G NR (gNB)

eNB eNB
eNB eNB eNB eNB (NSA Anchor) (NSA Anchor)
(NSA Anchor) (NSA Anchor) (NSA Anchor) (NSA Anchor)
eNB eNB 1

Operator A Operator B Operator A Operator B Operator A Operator B

User Experience (from good -> bad)

Affects end user throughput and latency:
• complicated camping strategy • complicated camping strategy
No impact
• misalignment of TAC boundary • inter-vendor load balancing not supported
• misalignment of TAC boundary

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thanks