A Tutorial Overview of WiMAX

OLE GRNDALEN

WiMAX is a fixed and mobile wireless access technology based on the IEEE 802.16 standard. It is a technology that has its origin in the computer industry and is an alternative to 3GPP technologies like HSPA and LTE. This article seeks to give a tutorial overview of the WiMAX technology, its current status and future development.

Ole Grndalen is Research Scientist in Telenor Corporate Development

History
In 1999 the IEEE Standards Board established a working group called IEEE 802.16 to develop standards for the global deployment of broadband Wireless Metropolitan Area Networks. The first standard was published in 2001 and specified the Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) of a system targeted for frequency bands in the range 10 to 66 GHz and named IEEE 802.16-2001 [2]. The system was a point-to-multipoint (P-MP) system with optional support for MESH topology. Line-of-sight (LOS) or near LOS was usually required between the base station and the user terminal antennas, and highly directional antennas were used at the user terminals. The PHY was a single carrier solution and the channel bandwidth was typically 28 MHz. Many of the people working on the standard in the early phase of the development had close ties to the cable industry and the system was generally seen as a wireless cable system. The most advanced cable standard at the time was DOCSIS and the DOCSIS MAC was chosen as the basis for the MAC of the wireless system. Following the publication of the IEEE 802.16-2001 standard, a group of equipment vendors led by Nokia formed an organization called WiMAX Forum to promote the adoption of systems based on this standard. In 2001 the IEEE 802.16 group started to develop an amendment to the standard that specified MAC modifications and additional PHY specifications for operation in frequency bands between 2 and 11 GHz. The amendment was approved in January 2003 and given the name IEEE 802.16a-2003 [3]. The amendment specified three additional PHYs, one single carrier (SCa) and two multicarrier alternatives called OFDM and OFDMA. Systems based on the 16a amendment could operate in either licensed or license-exempt1) frequency bands.

WiMAX Forum, which focused on the original high frequency PHY option, did not have the growth and success that the founding companies had hoped for due to limited interest for equipment targeting such high frequencies. In April 2003, Intel together with other companies from the WLAN industry like Proxim, Fujitsu Microelectronics and Wi-LAN joined WiMAX Forum and took over the leadership of the organization. With the takeover or restart of the Forum the focus was changed from the original high frequency PHY option to the 2-11 GHz PHY options, or from wireless cable to Wi-Fi on steroids. By targeting lower frequency bands, the equipment costs were lower and the systems could operate under nonLOS conditions. But it was still a fixed wireless system, mainly applied as an ADSL alternative or complement. In 2003, IEEE started a full revision of the standard that was completed the year after and resulted in a new version of the standard called IEEE 802.16-2004 [4]. One of the changes made was that the operating frequency range for the low frequency PHYs were extended to include all frequencies below 11 GHz. In December 2005, a new amendment to the standard called IEEE 802.16e-2005 [5] was approved which included enhancements to the MAC and OFDMA PHY to support mobile operation. Systems based on this amendment and the OFDMA PHY were denoted Mobile WiMAX by WiMAX Forum since these systems were mainly targeted for nomadic and mobile applications as an alternative to eg. UMTS/HSPA. In 2009 a new revision of the standard called IEEE 802.16-2009 [6] was published that included the 16e amendment and some other amendments and corrigendum. So from 1999 and up to today, WiMAX has gone through great changes and developed from a wireless cable system to a mobile broadband system. But even

1) Originally the licensed and license-exempt systems were split as 16a (SCa, OFDM) and 16b (OFDMA) project respectively, but was

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if the target application has changed dramatically, many of the solutions used in WiMAX can be traced back to the original WiMAX systems; for example is the WiMAX MAC still very similar to the DOCSIS MAC.

in several others. It publishes white papers and other promotional material. Generally, it plays a central role for streamlining and coordinating the information about WiMAX that is sent to the market.

WiMAX Forum
WiMAX Forum is an industry organisation formed to promote the adoption of WiMAX compatible products and services. The members include chip manufacturers, equipment vendors, operators and others. WiMAX Forum plays a similar role for the development of systems based on the IEEE 802.16 standard as Wi-Fi Alliance plays for systems based on the IEEE 802.11 standard. One of the most important tasks that WiMAX Forum performs is to control a certification arrangement that ensures that WiMAX equipment from different vendors can interoperate and that WiMAX equipment satisfies given minimum performance and functionality requirements. Equipment is certified according to one or more profiles, which represent selections of options from the IEEE 802.16 standard. The certification itself is performed by certification labs which are appointed by WiMAX Forum. As a help to vendors prior to certification, WiMAX Forum organises PlugFests which are informal gatherings where vendors can bring their products and test interoperability against each others products. The PlugFests are also a good opportunity to reveal ambiguities in the standard. WiMAX Forum has developed and is enhancing an end-to-end network specification for WiMAX systems. Initially, standardization was not considered to be a task that the Forum should perform. But operators and others saw a need for certification of network components, and since IEEE 802.16 only specifies layer 1 and 2 functionality WiMAX Forum decided to develop a network specification. A very important activity in WiMAX Forum is to participate in and influence regulatory bodies to ensure that WiMAX can be allowed to operate in appropriate frequency bands. For example did WiMAX Forum play an important role when Mobile WiMAX was approved by ITU as an IMT-2000 [7] system and when Mobile WiMAX was proposed as a candidate system for IMT-Advanced. WiMAX Forum is also often one of the organizations that are consulted by national regulators on questions related to spectrum for fixed and mobile wireless systems, for example before spectrum auctions. WiMAX Forum is very active in promoting WiMAX. It organizes its own conference series and participates

The two WiMAX Variants

WiMAX comes in two variants denoted Fixed WiMAX and Mobile WiMAX. Fixed WiMAX is based on the OFDM PHY in the IEEE 802.16 standard. As the name suggests, Fixed WiMAX is designed for providing fixed and nomadic services. Fixed WiMAX is usually deployed as an ADSL alternative or complement. Fixed WiMAX is targeted for operation in licensed and license-exempt frequency bands below 11 GHz. Currently, certified equipment is available for the 3.5 GHz band, both in Time Division Duplexing (TDD) and Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) versions. Mobile WiMAX is based on the OFDMA PHY in the IEEE 802.16 standard. This PHY is more flexible and powerful than the OFDM PHY, but also more complex. Mobile WiMAX is primarily targeted for providing nomadic and mobile services, but can also be used for providing fixed services. It is targeted for use in licensed frequency bands below 6 GHz. Currently equipment is available for the 2.3 GHz, 2.5 GHz and 3.5 GHz frequency bands, but only in TDD versions. FDD versions of Mobile WiMAX are expected to appear later. In 2007 the TDD version of Mobile WiMAX was approved by ITU as an IMT-2000 system denoted IMT-2000 OFDMA TDD WMAN [7].

WiMAX Medium Access (MAC) Layer

The WiMAX MAC comprises three sublayers: The service specific convergence sublayer (CS), the MAC common part sublayer (MAC CPS), and the security sublayer. The data units are communicated between the sublayers through Service Access Points (SAPs).
Convergence Sublayer (CS)

The CS performs the following functions: Accepting higher layer protocol data units (PDUs) from the higher layer; Performing classification of higher layer PDUs; Processing (if required) the higher layer PDUs based on the classification; Delivering CS PDUs to the appropriate MAC SAP;

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 Receiving CS PDUs from the peer entity. The main function of the CS is to classify incoming higher layer Protocol Data Units (PDUs) and send them to the appropriate transport connection. The classification is performed with a set of classification rules. A classification rule consists of some protocolspecific packet matching criteria (eg. destination IP address), a classification rule priority, and a reference to a transport Connection ID (CID). The highest priority classification rule that a packet matches determines which transport connection the packet is forwarded to. Downlink classification rules are applied by the BS to packets it is transmitting and uplink classification rules are applied by the user terminal. CS support for IPv4 and IPv6 packets are mandatory for Mobile WiMAX systems. Support for Ethernet, IPv4 over Ethernet and IPv6 over Ethernet is mandatory for base stations but optional for user terminals.
MAC Common Part Sublayer

From higher layers

CS SAP

Service Specific Convergence Sublayer (CS)

MAC Common Part Sublayer Security sublayer PHY SAP PHY

The 802.16 MAC is connection-oriented. All services, including inherently connectionless services, are mapped to a connection. Connections are unidirectional and referenced with 16-bit connection identifiers (CIDs). A connection is associated with a set of QoS requirements. There are multiple connections between a BS and a terminal, where different connections carry data with different QoS requirement. Packets from the different connections are allocated transmission time-frequency slots by a scheduler. One of the main tasks of the scheduler is to allocate the transmission slots in such a way that the QoS requirements of each connection are satisfied. Uplink request/grant scheduling is performed by the BS with the intent of providing each subordinate terminal with bandwidth for uplink transmissions or opportunities to request bandwidth. By specifying a scheduling type and its associated QoS parameters, the BS scheduler can anticipate the throughput and latency needs of the uplink traffic and provide polls and/or grants at the appropriate times. To poll a terminal, the BS allocates time/frequency slots sufficient for a Bandwidth Request (BR) message to the terminal. The terminal will see that it has been allocated time/ frequency slots in the UL-MAP message sent by the BS. Polling is done on terminal basis. Bandwidth is always requested on a CID basis and bandwidth is allocated on a terminal basis. Fixed and Mobile WiMAX supports four and five scheduling classes respectively: UGS (Unsolicited Grant Service) The UGS class is designed to support real-time

Physical layer (PHY)

Figure 1 The WiMAX MAC layer

Packet from higher layer entity

Match with classification rule 1? No Match with classification rule 2? No Match with classification rule 3?

Yes

Forward packet to connection 1

Yes

Forward packet to connection 2 Yes

Match with classification rule n?

Yes

Forward packet to connection M

Figure 2 Packet classification perfomed by the Convergence Sublayer

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MAC SAP

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uplink service flows that transport fixed-size data packets on a periodic basis, such as T1/E1 and Voice over IP without silence suppression. The service offers fixed-size grants on a real-time periodic basis, which eliminate the overhead and latency of SS requests and assure that grants are available to meet the flows real-time needs. Among the mandatory QoS parameters are Minimum Reserved Traffic Rate, Maximum Latency and Tolerated Jitter. rtPS (real-time Polling Service) The rtPS is designed to support real-time uplink service flows that transport variable-size data packets on a periodic basis, such as MPEG video. The service offers real-time, periodic request opportunities, which meet the flows real-time needs and allow the terminal to specify the size of the desired grant. This service requires more request overhead than UGS, but supports variable grant sizes. The mandatory QoS parameters include Minimum Reserved Traffic Rate, Maximum Sustained Traffic Rate, Maximum Latency and Unsolicited Polling Interval. ertPS (extended real-time Polling Service) (Only Mobile WiMAX) Extended rtPS is a scheduling mechanism which builds on the efficiency of both UGS and rtPS. The BS provides unicast grants in an unsolicited manner like in UGS, thus saving the latency of a bandwidth request message. However, whereas UGS allocations are fixed in size, ertPS allocations are dynamic. The BS may provide periodic uplink allocations that may be used for requesting the bandwidth as well as for data transfer. There is a default allocation size that can be changed by the terminal. The mandatory QoS parameters include Maximum Sustained Traffic Rate, the Minimum Reserved Traffic Rate, the Maximum Latency and Unsolicited Grant Interval. nrtPS (non-real-time Polling Service) The nrtPS offers unicast polls on a regular basis, which assures that the uplink service flow receives request opportunities even during network congestion. The BS typically polls nrtPS connections on an interval on the order of one second or less. The mandatory QoS parameters for this scheduling service are Minimum Reserved Traffic Rate, Maximum Sustained Traffic Rate and Traffic Priority. BE (Best Effort) The best effort service provides no QoS guarantees. The service is suitable for data streams for which no minimum service level is required and therefore may be handled on a space-available basis.

Security Sublayer

The security sublayer provides subscribers with privacy, authentication, or confidentiality across the broadband wireless network. This is done by applying cryptographic transforms to the data carried across connections between a terminal and a BS. In addition, the security sublayer provides operators with strong protection from theft of service. The security sublayer employs an authenticated client/server key management protocol in which the BS, the server, controls distribution of keying material to client terminals. Additionally, the basic security mechanisms are strengthened by adding digitalcertificate-based terminal device-authentication to the key management protocol.

Fixed WiMAX Physical layer

The physical layer of Fixed WiMAX is based on an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) scheme with 200 subcarriers. Since a 256-point Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) is usually used for implementing the modulation and demodulation of the signal, the signal is often interpreted as consisting of 256 carriers but where only 200 of them are nonzero. OFDM is a modulation scheme that is very robust against multi-path propagation conditions. The signal received by a user terminal or a base station can be interpreted as being the sum of several copies of the same signal that has travelled along different paths from the transmitter to the receiver. Since the signals have travelled along different paths, they have different delay and attenuation. This leads to frequency selective fading and inter-symbol interference (ISI). The frequency selective fading causes different attenuation of each sub-carrier in the signal. However, by using sufficiently small frequency separations between the sub-carriers, each sub-carrier will experience a channel that has a nearly flat frequency response. Hence, the sub-carriers will be attenuated but virtually un-distorted. To reduce the ISI, each OFDM symbol is appended with a cyclic prefix (a.k.a. guard interval). The length of the prefix is chosen such that it absorbs most of the ISI. The receiver can ignore the signal during the time corresponding to the cyclic prefix, hence the part of the signal used for decoding the data will be virtually ISI-free. The result is little waste of time and power to achieve an almost ISI free channel. In Fixed WiMAX the cyclic prefix can be 1/4, 1/8, 1/16 or 1/32 of the (useful) symbol length. The (useful) symbol length and the subcarrier separation cannot be chosen independently; their product must equal 1.

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Pilot subcarriers Zero subcarriers (guard band) DC subcarrier Data subcarriers Zero subcarriers (guard band)

Frequency

Figure 3 OFDM frequency description

Usually, each OFDM symbol carries data to or from a single user terminal. However, there is optionally support for dividing the subcarriers into 2, 4, 8 or 16 groups, where the groups can carry data to or from different terminals. This is called subchannelization. The sub-carriers belonging to a subchannel is unevenly spread across the bandwidth of the channel. The main advantage of using subchannelization is lower peak transmission power requirements for the user terminals for a given coverage, or increased coverage for a given terminal peak transmission power.

Table 1 lists the FFT size used for different channel bandwidths. An OFDMA symbol can be considered as consisting of three types of subcarriers; data, pilot and null subcarriers. As the name indicates, the data subcarriers carry information data. The pilot subcarriers are used for various estimation and synchronization purposes. The null subcarriers represent carriers with amplitude equal to zero. By using the notion of null carriers an OFDMA symbol can be thought of as consisting of the same number of subcarriers as given by the FFT size, but where some of the carriers (ie. the null subcarriers) are not used. The subcarriers of an OFDMA symbol are partitioned into subsets of subcarriers called subchannels. The subcarriers forming one subchannel may, but do not need to be adjacent. There are different ways of allocating subcarriers to subchannels. The subcarrier allocation modes are given names such as PUSC (Partial Usage of Subchannels), FUSC (Full Usage of Subchannels), AMC

Mobile WiMAX Physical Layer

The Mobile WiMAX physical layer is called OFDMA, which is essentially a more flexible version of OFDM where subchannelization is generally utilized. That is, an OFDMA symbol usually carries data to or from multiple users. One advantage of the OFDMA PHY over the OFDM PHY is that it can use different numbers of subcarriers. In this way it is possible to better adapt the OFDMA PHY to the channel bandwidth. OFDMA modulation and demodulation are based on a 128, 512, 1024 or 2048 point FFT to adapt to different channel bandwidths. It can be noted that a 256 point FFT option has been left out, which seems very strange from a technical perspective. The reason for this is that the 256-point FFT mode is reserved for the OFDM PHY, which was the result of a political compromise in the IEEE 802.16 working group.

Channel bandwidth [MHz] FFT size

1.25

3.5

8.75

10

20

128

512

512

1024 1024 1024 2048

Table 1 FFT size for different channel bandwidths

Subcarriers belonging to subchannel 1

Frequency

Figure 4 OFDMA frequency description. Subcarriers with the same colour belong to the same subchannel
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(Adaptive Modulation and Coding) etc. The detailed descriptions of each of these modes are outside the scope of this article, so only some general considerations will be given here. The subchannel allocation schemes can be grouped into two main categories; distributed and adjacent allocations. For distributed allocations, the subcarriers belonging to a subchannel are distributed pseudorandomly over the whole channel bandwidth. This is advantageous in mobile scenarios where the channel characteristics change rapidly as the terminal moves. By using the whole channel bandwidth, the system becomes robust against frequency selective fading that can cause large attenuation in parts of the frequency band. Another advantage of distributed subcarrier allocation is that inter-cell interference is averaged. In the adjacent subcarrier allocation mode, the subcarriers of a subchannel are adjacent and are confined to only a part of the channel bandwidth. This mode is advantageous when the terminals are stationary or slowly moving. Subcarriers located in the part of the channel bandwidth where the channel attenuation is smallest is then used for transferring data between the transmitter and the receiver, hence the system capacity is improved. OFDMA symbols are grouped into frames. The structure of a frame depends on whether Time Division Duplexing (TDD) or Frequency Division Duplexing (FDD) is used. In TDD mode the same frequency is

used for both downlink and uplink transmissions, while in FDD mode different frequencies are used. To allow for terminals with lower complexity and lower cost, half duplex FDD is also supported in FDD mode. The following description applies to TDD based Mobile WiMAX, as all equipment certified up to the time of writing (February 2010) is of this type. Figure 5 shows the general structure of a WiMAX TDD frame. It consists of a downlink interval and an uplink interval separated by a transmit/receive transition gap (TTG) and a receive/transmit transition gap (RTG). The TTG allows time for the BS to switch from transmit to receive mode. During this gap, the BS is not transmitting modulated data but simply allowing the BS transmitter carrier to ramp down, the transmit/receive antenna switch to actuate, and the BS receiver section to activate. The RTG allows time for the BS to switch from receive to transmit mode. During this gap, the BS is not transmitting modulated data but simply allowing the BS transmitter carrier to ramp up and the transmit/receive antenna switch to actuate. The lengths of the transition gaps determine the maximum cell size of a system. For example, the TTG must be larger than the time it takes the signal to travel from the BS to the furthest located user terminal and back. For a given value of the TTG, the cell size can be increased by employing more intelligent transmission opportunity scheduling of the furthest located user terminals.

OFDMA symbol number k k+1 FCH k+3 k+5 k+7 k+9 k+11 k+13 k+15 k+17 k+20 k+23 k+26 Ranging subchannel UL burst #1

1 k+29 k+30 k+32 FCH

DL burst #1 (carrying the UL MAP)

s s+1 s+2

DL burst #3

UL burst #2 DL burst #4

Subchannel logical number

Preamble

Preamble
RTG

DL-MAP

UL burst #3 DL burst #5

DL burst #2

DL burst #6t

UL burst #4

s+L DL TTG

UL burst #5 UL

Figure 5 General structure of a WiMAX TDD frame

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DL-MAP

Each downlink interval begins with a preamble followed by the Frame Control header (FCH), the DL MAP and the UL MAP. The FCH specifies the burst profile and the length of the DL-MAP. The DL-MAP and UL-MAP message defines the usage of the DL and UL intervals respectively. To make it possible to optimally support different types of terminals, a frame can be divided into multiple permutation zones. A permutation zone is a number of contiguous OFDMA symbols, in the downlink or the uplink, that use the same subcarrier allocation mode. The downlink subframe or the uplink subframe may contain more than one permutation zone as illustrated in Figure 6. Downlink and uplink subframes both start in PUSC mode, which is a mode that uses a distributed subcarrier allocation scheme. The PUSC subcarrier allocation zone can then be switched to a different type of subcarrier allocation zone, where the switching is described in the DL-MAP. By for example switching to a band AMC zone, where an adjacent subcarrier allocation mode is used, fixed and nomadic terminals can be optimally served. WiMAX supports a vide variety of advanced multiantenna implementations. The term MIMO (Multiple Input Multiple Output) is often used in connection with multiple antenna implementations, but often with slightly different definitions, and hence, which implementations that are included. In this article MIMO will simply be used to refer to any multiantenna technology. An important parameter for a MIMO system is the number of antennas used at the transmitter and receiver, and a system with Nt transmit antennas and Nr receive antennas is denoted a (Nt Nr) MIMO system. MIMO technologies can be divided into two groups: open loop MIMO and closed loop MIMO. In open loop MIMO the transmitter does not utilize any knowledge of the propagation channel, while in closed loop MIMO the transmitter collects information about the propagation channel and optimizes the signal transmitted. WiMAX supports several types of open loop MIMO: Space Time Coding (STC), Spatial Multiplexing (SM) and collaborative SM. With STC multiple antennas are used at the transmitter while the receiver can have one or more antennas. Differently encoded versions of the same data stream are fed into each transmitter antenna, so that transmitter space diversity is created. This makes the transmission much more robust against multipath propaga-

tion. The capacity is not increased directly as it is for SM, but it can increase indirectly since more robust reception means that higher order modulation and channel coding schemes can be used. STC can be used for improving the coverage of a network. STC is often referred to as the Matrix-A scheme in WiMAX. With SM multiple antennas are used at both the transmitter and receiver. A datastream is split into a number of sub-streams that are transmitted from different antennas using the same time and frequency allocations. In a sufficiently diverse multi-path environment the multiple signals will arrive at the receiving antennas with sufficiently different spatial signatures to allow the receiver to discern the multiple data streams. The result is an increase in capacity. The capacity can be increased by a factor equal to the minimum number of antennas at the transmitter and receiver, for example a 4 4 MIMO system can increase the capacity by a factor of 4 while a 4 2 MIMO system can increase the capacity by a factor

Preamble

Zone switches are described in DL-MAP

PUSC (first zone contains DL-MAP)

FUSC

AMC

Optional PUSC AMC

Figure 6 OFDMA TDD frame with multiple zones

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Downlink subframe

PUSC

Uplink subframe

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h 11 x1 z1
Space-time encoder and z 2 beamformer

h 12 h 13 h 23 h 22 h 21

y1
Space-time decoder and combiner

^ x

However, in practice feedback is used to avoid calibration of the RF components. For FDD systems, using feedback is the only option. Downlink MU-MIMO, also called Space Division Multiple Access (SDMA) in the IEEE 802.16 standard, can be viewed as overlaying up to four singleuser beamforming transmissions at the same timefrequency resource.

x2

z3

y2

^ x

Figure 7 A 3x2 MIMO system

of 2. SM is also often referred to as the Matrix-B scheme in WiMAX.

WiMAX Network Architecture

In order to always operate in the most efficient way, a WiMAX system that uses MIMO should support both STC and SM. STC performs better than SM when the SNR is low, which can for example typically occur near the cell edge. SM performs better than STC in high SNR situations. Hence, to operate in the most efficient way at all times, the system should be able to switch between STC and SM. Collaborative SM is a technique where two user terminals, each having a single antenna can use the same time and frequency allocation to transmit towards a BS with two (or more) antennas. This technique can effectively double the uplink capacity of a system. Closed loop MIMO techniques can achieve better performance than open-loop MIMO by exploiting channel state information on the transmitter side. Closed-loop MIMO techniques in WiMAX include MIMO precoding and downlink Multi-User MIMO (MU-MIMO). MIMO precoding can be interpreted as generalized beamforming. Consider for example the 3 2 MIMO system shown in Figure 7. The signals y1 and y2 received by antenna 1 and 2 respectively are given by:
y1 y2 = h11 h21 h12 h22 h13 h23 x1 x2 + n1 n2

The IEEE 802.16 standard only specifies the PHY and MAC layers of the system. But it was recognized in WiMAX Forum among operators and others that it could be useful to have a standard network architecture defined as well. With a standard network architecture in place, network components can be certified ensuring interoperability of equipment from different vendors and a minimum level of functionality and performance. Since developing a WiMAX network architecture is outside the scope of IEEE 802.16, it was decided to do it within WiMAX Forum. It was also decided that the WiMAX network architecture should be an all IP architecture in order to maximize the use of open standards and IETF protocols. Figure 8 shows the Network Reference Model (NRM) [8], which is a logical representation of the WiMAX network architecture. The WiMAX NRM differentiates between network access providers (NAPs) and network service providers (NSPs). The NAP is a business entity that provides WiMAX radio access infrastructure, while the NSP is the business entity that provides IP connectivity and WiMAX services to WiMAX subscribers according to some service level agreements with one or more NAPs. The SS/MS, ASN and CSN represent a logical grouping of functions. The SS/MS represents the user terminal; SS refers to a fixed terminal while MS refers to a mobile terminal. The terminal interacts with the base stations of an ASN through the reference point R1 representing the radio interface. The ASN represents the functions required to provide radio access to the user terminal (SS/MS). It includes one or more ASN gateways which represents an aggregation of centralized functions related to QoS, security and mobility management for all data connections served by its associated base stations. The CSN represents a set of network functions that provide IP connectivity services to WiMAX subscribers. Some of the key functions of the CSN are:

w11 w21 w31

w12 w22 w32

or y = HWx + n, where hij denotes the channel between transmit antenna j and receive antenna i, W is the precoding matrix and n is the received noise. The capacity of the system can be optimized by choosing the best precoding matrix W. In order for the transmitter to be able to find the optimum precoding matrix, it must know the channel (ie. the channel matrix H). In TDD it is in principle possible to take advantage of the reciprocity of the channel so that the BS or terminal can use the received signals to estimate the channel.

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NAP R2 SS/MS

Visited NSP

Home NSP

ASN R1 BS R8 BS R6 R4 Another ASN ASN-GW

CSN R3 AAA HA DHCP

R5 HSS

CSN HA

ASP network or Internet

ASP network or Internet

Bearer plane Control plane ASN: CSN: AAA: SS/MS: HSS: Access Service Network Connectivity Service Network Authentication, Authorization and Accounting Subscriber/Moble Station Home Subscriber Server HA: BS: DHCP: R1-R8: ASN-GW: Home Agent Base Station Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol Reference Points ASN Gateway

Figure 8 WiMAX Network Reference Model

IP address management Connectivity to Internet CSN anchored inter-ASN mobility AAA proxy or server QoS policy and admission control Subscriber billing and inter-operator settlement

Mobility is supported by two tiers of anchoring. Every handover involves ASN anchored mobility, which is completely transparent to the core network (CSN). The ASN functions control the changes of the data paths within an ASN or between ASNs. If the foreign agent or IP subnet/prefix changes, a CSN anchored handover is also triggered. This handover procedure is based on client or proxy Mobile IP for IPv4 or IPv6.

of one or more MBS zones. An MBS zone is defined as a set of base stations where the same CID and the same security association are used for transmitting the content of certain service flow(s). Within an MBS zone, the MCBCS can be deployed with coordination or optionally with synchronization among the base stations of the MBS zone. If the BSs are coordinated, their transmission frames are aligned. This enables a terminal to continue receiving MBS transmissions from any BS within that zone even when the terminal is in sleep or idle mode. If all BSs in an MBS zone are frequency and time synchronized, they can form a single frequency network during the MCBCS intervals. This improves the received signal strength and statistics resulting in improved data rates and/or reliability levels. Service continuity, even when the terminal is moving, and power savings are maintained across the cells of the MBS zone with minimal interactions with the network.

Multicast and Broadcast

WiMAX supports Multicast and Broadcast Multimedia Services (MCBCS) to enable WiMAX networks to provide low-cost delivery of large volumes of popular contents like IP-TV and peer-to-peer media sharing to a group of users. Unicast services and MCBCS can be provided simultaneously by allocating different time intervals in the downlink subframes to the services. The MCBCS data streams are typically transmitted to a geographic MCBCS zone, which again consists

Next Generation WiMAX

In October 2007 Mobile WiMAX was approved as a new IMT-2000 technology by ITU. The version of Mobile WiMAX that was included is based on TDD, and to reflect this ITU denoted it IMT-2000 OFDMA TDD WMAN. By having this label WiMAX can get access to spectrum allocated for IMT-2000 systems. Currently IEEE and WiMAX

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Forum is trying to get the FDD version of Mobile WiMAX included in IMT-2000 as well. ITU has also defined a set of requirements for a new generation of mobile systems to follow the IMT-2000 systems. The new system family is called IMTAdvanced and sometimes referred to as the 4th generation of mobile systems denoted 4G. As a natural continuation of the IMT-2000 approval, WiMAX Forum and IEEE want WiMAX to be approved as an IMT-Advanced technology as well. Currently ITU has only received two proposals for IMT-Advanced technologies; one based on Mobile WiMAX and one based on LTE. The Mobile WiMAX system proposed for IMTAdvanced is based on a new amendment to the IEEE 802.16 standard called IEEE 802.16m, which is still being developed. The 16m amendment contains new functionality and new methods for enhancing the system performance which will make it possible to satisfy the IMT-Advanced requirements. Basically, the goal for the development of the 16m amendment has been to deliver twice the performance gain over a current Mobile WiMAX system in various measures including sector throughput, average user throughput, peak data rate and cell-edge performance. The Mobile WiMAX system proposed for IMTAdvanced employs OFDMA as the multiple-access scheme in both downlink and uplink. Both TDD and FDD duplexing schemes are supported. The bandwidth is scalable between 5 and 20 MHz by using different FFT sizes. The system supports multi-carrier operation that allows operation in any bandwidth as wide as 100 MHz by aggregating contiguous and/or non-contiguous RF carriers. Each candidate technology for IMT-Advanced has to be evaluated according to criteria and a methodology given by ITU. The submission of a candidate technology for IMT-Advanced to the ITU must include a self-evaluation of the technology. This will later be followed by an evaluation performed by one or more independent evaluation groups. The results of the

self-evaluation of Mobile WiMAX performed by IEEE can be used as an initial indication of the performance of next generation Mobile WiMAX. The performance was estimated for four different scenarios: InH: Indoor hotspot scenario UMi: Urban Micro-cell scenario UMa: Urban Macro-cell scenario RMa: Rural Macro scenario

The estimated spectrum efficiencies for TDD based Mobile WiMAX for the different scenarios are given in Table 2. The IMT-Advanced requirements are shown in parentheses. It can be seen that the estimated performance is above the ITU requirements in all cases, and well above in most cases. Table 3 shows the spectral efficiency of TDD based Mobile WiMAX in mobile scenarios. Again the results are well above the ITU requirements. More results can be found in [1].

WiMAX Equipment and Deployment Status

Deployment Status
As of February 2010 WiMAX Forum had registered about 560 WiMAX deployments distributed over 147 countries. It is estimated that WiMAX service providers cover more than 621 million people. According to Marvedis, the total number of WiMAX subscribers was 4.73 millions in Q3 2009 and expected to rise to about 6.5 million by the end of Q4 2009. There are more Fixed WiMAX deployments than Mobile WiMAX in the world, but in the autumn of 2009 the number of Mobile WiMAX subscribers surpassed the number of Fixed WiMAX subscribers. Figure 9 shows Mobile and Fixed WiMAX networks that are either in service or in deployment by February 2010.

Scenario

DL average spectrum efficiency [bit/s/Hz/cell] 6.93 (3.0) 3.22 (2.6) 2.41 (2.2) 3.23 (1.1)

DL cell edge spectrum efficiency [bit/s/Hz/cell] 0.260 (0.1) 0.092 (0.075) 0.069 (0.06) 0.093 (0.04)

UL average spectrum efficiency [bit/s/Hz/cell] 5.99 (2.25) 2.58 (1.8) 2.57 (1.4) 2.66 (0.7)

UL cell edge spectrum efficiency [bit/s/Hz/cell] 0.426 (0.07) 0.111 (0.05) 0.109 (0.03) 0.119 (0.015)

InH UMi UMa Rma

Table 2 Spectrum efficiency for TDD based Mobile WiMAX. ITUs IMT-Advanced requirements in parantheses
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Median SINR (in dB)

Spectral efficiency for LOS [bit/s/Hz] 3.76 1.81 1.72 1.70

Spectral efficiency for non-LOS [bit/s/Hz] 3.41 1.50 1.30 1.23

ITU-R Required spectral efficiency [bit/s/Hz] 1.0 0.75 0.55 0.25

InH (10 km/h) UMi (30 km/h) UMa (120 km/h) RMa (350 km/h)

16.6 5.0 4.3 5.6

Table 3 Spectral efficiency in mobile scenarios for TDD based Mobile WiMAX

The five largest operators of the world are listed in Table 4. The worlds largest and most important WiMAX network is Clearwires WiMAX deployments in the US. Clearwire is the result of a merger performed in 2008 between the original Clearwire and the former Sprint Xohm WiMAX network infrastructure. Intel, Google and the three cable TV companies Comcast, Time Warner Cable and Bright House Networks are also shareholders of the company. Sprint has contributed all its 2.5 GHz spectrum holdings, giving the new Clearwire over 100 MHz of spectrum in most markets in the US. Clearwire offers WiMAX in 27 markets across the US covering 34 million people, including Chicago,

Las Vegas, Philadelphia, Seattle and Honolulu. Clearwire plans to extend its operation to more markets in 2010 including New York, Boston, Washington DC, Houston, the San Francisco Bay Area, Denver, Minneapolis and Kansas City covering up to 120 million people by the end of 2010.

Equipment Availability
As of February 2010 certified equipment is available for two Fixed WiMAX profiles and five Mobile WiMAX profiles. 191 different certified products are available from 45 vendors; 60 base stations and 131 subscriber stations. Currently, most of the subscriber stations are USB dongles and PC cards. Some laptops with integrated WiMAX capability are also available. Intel has

Figure 9 Fixed (red) and Mobile (blue) WiMAX networks that are either in service or in deployment as of February 2010 (source http://www.wimaxmaps.org/)
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Operator

Country

Frequency band

Approximate number of subscribers 690.000 350.000 300.000 290.000 250.000

Clearwire Yota Inukshuk Korea Telecom Telmex

US Russia Canada Korea Mexico

2.5 GHz 2.5 GHz 2.5 GHz 2.3 GHz 3.5 GHz

5 IEEE Standard 802.16e-2005. Amendment to IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Part 16: Air Interface for Fixed Broadband Wireless Access Systems Physical and Medium Access Control Layers for Combined Fixed and Mobile Operation in Licensed Bands. February 28, 2006. (Free download of PDF via Get IEEE 802.) 6 IEEE Standard 802.16-2009. IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Part 16: Air Interface for Broadband Wireless Access Systems. May 29, 2009. (Free download of PDF via Get IEEE 802.) 7 Recommendation ITU-R M.1457-8. Detailed specifications of the radio interfaces of international mobile telecommunications 2000 (IMT2000). May 2009. 8 WiMAX Forum. Network Architecture Release 1.0 Version 4 Stage 2: Architecture Tenets, Reference Model and Reference Points. February 3, 2009.

Table 4 The five largest WiMAX operators in the world

already integrated 2.5 GHz WiMAX in its Centrino chipset and plans to include all the other Mobile WiMAX frequency bands. Very few WiMAX handsets are available today.

Reference list
1 ITU-R Working Party 5D: Document 5D/542 Submission of a candidate IMT-Advanced RIT based on IEEE 802.16. October 3, 2009. 2 IEEE Standard 802.16-2001. IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Part 16: Air Interface for Fixed Broadband Wireless Access Systems. April 8, 2002. (Free download of PDF via Get IEEE 802.) 3 IEEE Standard 802.16a-2003. IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Part 16: Air Interface for Fixed Broadband Wireless Access Systems Amendment 2: Medium Access Control Modifications and Additional Physical Layer Specifications for 2-11 GHz. April 1, 2003. (Free download of PDF via Get IEEE 802.) 4 IEEE Standard 802.16-2004. IEEE Standard for Local and Metropolitan Area Networks Part 16: Air Interface for Fixed Broadband Wireless Access Systems. October 1, 2004. (Free download of PDF via Get IEEE 802.)

Bibliography
Etemad, K. Overview of mobile WiMAX technology and evolution. IEEE Communications Magazine, 46 (10), 31-40, 2008. Fan Wang et al. Mobile WiMAX systems: Performance and evolution. IEEE Communications Magazine, 46 (10), 41-49, 2008. Etemad, K, Wang, L. Multicast and Broadcast Multimedia Services in Mobile WiMAX Networks. IEEE Communications Magazine, 47 (10), 2009.

Ole Grndalen received a Master of Science degree in physics from the University of Oslo in 1987. Since then he has been working with development and analysis of radio systems at Telenor Corporate Development. He has participated in several international cooperative research projects within the European Commission framework programs focusing on broadband systems. He has participated in IEEE 802.16 and WiMAX Forum. email: ole.grondalen@telenor.com

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