First LTE handover test completed on software compliant with commercial standard baseline

Nokia Siemens Networks drives LTE towards commercialization with successful test of key feature to enable continuous connectivity.

Nokia Siemens Networks recently conducted the world’s first LTE handover test using a commercially available base station and fully standards compliant software. The test verifies that the LTE handover procedure is handled correctly by both Nokia Siemens Networks Flexi Multiradio base station and an LTE test terminal.

Handover is a key feature of mobile radio technology. The LTE handover test is the first to be fully compliant with 3GPP’s (the relevant LTE standards body) March 2009 baseline LTE standard. In this initial test, the handover was made between LTE cells of Nokia Siemens Networks’ award winning Flexi Multiradio base station. Handover support is needed to enable seamless connectivity when the handling of a user’s mobile call is switched from one mobile cell to another, such as occurs when a user is moving.

“Our focus at Nokia Siemens Networks is on commercial hardware and software, not pre-commercial intermediate solutions,” said Marc Rouanne, head of Nokia Siemens Networks’ Radio Access business unit. “We’ve already shipped LTE-capable Flexi Base Station hardware to over 100 customers and this LTE handover on our standards compliant software is another step on the road to the commercial deployment of LTE.“

The test builds on the earlier verification of handover support in the company’s Evolved Packet Core solution for LTE core networks including the Flexi NG and Flexi NS products. Standard compliant LTE network products and terminals are a precondition for commercial network rollouts and for users to benefit from a choice of LTE devices from different vendors.

Nokia Siemens Networks is committed to driving the commercial uptake of LTE, starting in 2010, with an end-to-end solution that provides a future-proof, easy and cost efficient path to LTE via a software upgrade only.