FRAMES: Future radio wideband multiple access system

• Unité de recherche: PCRD EU
• Numéro de projet: 95.0771
• Titre du projet anglais: FRAMES: Future radio wideband multiple access system

Mots-clé (Anglais)

UMTS; Future Land Mobile System; Mobile Communications; Air-Interface; Radio Network; Adaptive Air Interface; 3rd Generation Mobile Telecommunication System

Autre Numéro de projet (Anglais)

EU project number: AC090

Programme de recherche (Anglais)

EU-programme: 4. Frame Research Programme - 1.2 Communications technologies

Description succincte (Anglais)

See abstract

Partenaires et organisations internationales (Anglais)

Siemens (D), CSEM SA (CH), Ericsson (S), Nokia (FIN),
CNET (F), IMS (E), 8 universities

Résumé des résultats (Abstract) (Anglais)

The FRAMES Project specifies and demonstrates the future 3rd generation mobile telecommunication system (UMTS) and focus upon the following key aspects:
· Specification of the UMTS air-interface comprising the physical layer functions (adaptive multiple access techniques), the low layer protocol functions (such as admission, power control, signalling, link adaptation, logical & physical layer definition) and the high layer protocol functions.
· Provision and demonstration of up to 2 Mbps transmission over air interface
· Implementation of a platform allowing the validation of these functions and the demonstration of various services operated on a complete UMTS demonstrator. This platform has also been linked to the RAINBOW demonstrator (RAINBOW is another ACTS Project which addresses the network aspects of the future UMTS system) in order to achieve a simulation of a complete UMTS system comprising one base station and two mobile stations.
CSEM involvement in the project was the following one:
· Contribution to the definition of the future UMTS air-interface (multiple access scheme - C/T/FDMA & OFDM, modulation scheme, interleaving and coding algorithms) as well as to the performance estimation based on advanced signal processing algorithms
· Contribution to the overall system design for all signal layers considered
· Contribution to the design and performance evaluation of advanced radio resource algorithms, signalling and network management principles
· Design and realisation of the RF-unit of the demonstrator and contribution to the realisation of the Loopback mode for the channel emulator evaluation
· Contribution to the overall demonstrator design
· Definition and realisation of the analysis unit for the demonstrator (for the data analysis and evaluation purposes). Trial and measurement campaign specification
· As unique participant to the FRAMES and RAINBOW projects simultaneously, co-ordination of the work done in both projects
The major achievement of the overall project can be summarised as follows:
· FRAMES was strongly involved in the standardisation process within ETSI. At the end of the day, the scheme retained by ETSI for the future UMTS air-interface standard (the multi-mode UTRA concept) was directly inspired from the proposal made by FRAMES and fostered individually by the project partners (NOKIA, ERICSSON, SIEMENS and CSEM) - which is a great success greeted by the European Commission. UTRA is based on FRAMES Mode 1 for TDD operation (now called TD-CDMA) and FRAMES mode 2 for FDD operation (now called W-CDMA)
· Sounding trials achieved at CNET laboratories allowed to characterise the air-interface in detail. Many tests have been done up to the end of the project, on September 1999 and reported in detail in the project documentation. These results will be precious for the design and the realisation of the future UMTS terminals. It is to be noticed that CSEM RF unit operated very well and gave highly satisfying results.
· A joint trial based on the merge of the FRAMES and RAINBOW demonstrators was achieved at CSEM premises in Neuchâtel. This joint trial was basically successful and allowed to demonstrate for the first time the inter-operability of UMTS base and mobile stations. A video was achieved and presented at the VTC'99 Conference.
To conclude, FRAMES and RAINBOW allowed to build up at CSEM a Competence Centre for the design and operation of UMTS solutions for Swiss and European companies.

Références bases de données (Anglais)

Swiss Database: Euro-DB of the
State Secretariat for Education and Research
Hallwylstrasse 4
CH-3003 Berne, Switzerland
Tel. [phone]
Swiss Project-Number: 95.0771