CBRS Alliance
Extends OnGo™ Support for 5G Deployments
CBRS Alliance will
develop new technical specifications to complement 3GPP’s air interface for 5G
services in the 3.5 GHz band
Today, the CBRS Alliance, an industry organization
focused on driving the development, commercialization, and adoption of OnGo™
shared spectrum solutions, announced the start of work on a new release of
specifications that will support OnGo over 5G. As OnGo commercial services over
LTE are poised for rollout, CBRS Alliance Release 3 will address support for 5G
deployments using shared spectrum in the 3.5 GHz band.
“The shared spectrum paradigm presented by CBRS has immense
potential to unlock value for carriers, equipment manufacturers and end users
alike because of the new business models that become possible,” said Joe
Madden, Principal Analyst at Mobile Experts. “By expanding the standards and
capabilities to support 5G applications, we expect enterprises with short
latency requirements and long time horizons to increase their investments in
CBRS and technologies such as OnGo.”
The new specifications from the CBRS Alliance will
complement 5G New Radio (5G NR), the new air interface developed by the 3rd
Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) to support the wide variety of 5G
services, devices, and deployments. The latest release of 5G NR is expected to
support operations in Band 48 and will improve the performance, flexibility,
scalability and efficiency of mobile networks while enabling industries to get
the most out of the available spectrum.
“Utilizing the CBRS band can be a key enabler for making 5G
deployments possible. The Alliance is hard at work developing technical
specifications to ensure that OnGo supports 5G applications as seamlessly as
traditional LTE services,” said Gary Boudreau, Chair of the CBRS Alliance’s
Technical Working Group. “The specifications in development include addressing
coexistence requirements to ensure seamless interoperability between LTE and 5G
NR in and out of Band 48, certificate-based authentication, and more.”
Globally, industry and government are focusing on 3.5 GHz as
the primary mid-band spectrum for 5G, with testing taking in place in Europe,
the Middle East and East Asia. In October 2018, the FCC made targeted changes
to its rules governing the 3.5 GHz band that will facilitate the deployment of
5G wireless networks using this spectrum.
With initial commercial deployments of OnGo expected as
early as Q2 2019, several use cases utilizing shared spectrum in the 3.5 GHz
band will become available, such as neutral host networks, private LTE, and
more. Use cases that require ultra-low latency, such as precision Industrial
IoT (IIoT), will be ideal for extension into 5G services, setting the stage for
the natural evolution of OnGo solutions.
Completion of Release 3 by the CBRS Alliance is expected to
conclude in Q4 2019, enabling OnGo 5G service availability in 2020.
Source: CBRS Alliance media announcement
