By Stephan Litjens, MulteFire Alliance Board Chair and VP Innovation Steering, Nokia
It has been a remarkable first year for the Alliance and we’re hitting the ground running as we begin 2017 with the finalization of the MulteFire Release 1.0 specification and associated technical paper.
Release 1.0, based on 3GPP Releases 13 and 14, defines LTE to operate in unlicensed and shared spectrum, while ensuring fair sharing of spectrum with other users and technologies such as Wi-Fi. MulteFire incorporates high quality LTE services and functionality supporting voice and data IP services locally, either independently as a private network and/or interworking with existing mobile networks to provide secure, seamless service as a neutral host.
By removing the requirement for an anchor in licensed spectrum, MulteFire will enable innovation in the enterprise and the booming Internet of Things (IoT) industry by offering new use cases and deployments of LTE technology. With MulteFire, businesses and property owners of public and private venues can create, install and operate their own private or neutral host MulteFire network in the same way that they do with Wi-Fi.
MulteFire Release 1.0 Technical Paper
In tandem with the completion of the MulteFire Release 1.0 specification, we are also publishing a white paper that provides technical insights into MulteFire. Key highlights from the paper include:
- An overview of the end-to-end architecture, designed to minimize the differences between LTE and MulteFire
- A detailed look at the reference architectures developed for MulteFire: It defines a traditional access mode for a single network operator as well as Neutral Host access mode where the same deployment can serve multiple operators
- How the specification defines interworking with LTE networks
- Insight into MulteFire’s robust anchor carrier design
- Performance evaluations and comparisons with Wi-Fi
To download the technical white paper, please fill out the form here.
Delivery of the Release 1.0 specification and technical white paper was made possible by the dedicated members of the MulteFire Alliance. Thank you to everyone who participated in development of both documents and we look forward to another great year of progress.
Release 1.0 is available to MulteFire Alliance members today and will be made available for public download by mid-2017. To be notified when the specification becomes publically available, click here.
To read the Release 1.0 Specification press release, click here.
Stephan Litjens, MulteFire Alliance Board Chair
Steph
an Litjens serves as the MulteFire Alliance Board Chair and is the VP of Innovation Steering at Nokia. His responsibilities include innovations both internally and externally with customers, partners, and governments to achieve Nokia’s ambition to create the Programmable World. Prior to his current role, Stephan was responsible for Nokia’s Mobile Broadband portfolio strategy.
Stephan joined Nokia in 1997 and has held several R&D, product marketing, services, product support and portfolio / product management and leadership positions in the mobile networks business. During the rise of 3G in the early 2000s, Stephan moved to Finland from the Netherlands. Since then he has been working for Nokia in Germany and in Japan before moving back to the Nokia headquarters in Espoo, Finland. He is enthusiastic about exploring opportunities, new ways of working and business prospects that can make a difference and inspire others.
