Alliance releases LTE-U/Wi-Fi plan

The Wi-Fi Alliance has announced the availability of the industry’s Coexistence Test Plan, the result of a cross-industry effort and extensive research, discussion and testing.

The plan marks the culmination of several months of collaboration involving dozens of companies from both the Wi-Fi and LTE-U (LTE in unlicensed spectrum) communities.

In a statement, the alliance said that the plan “will help ensure LTE-U devices can demonstrate they share unlicensed spectrum fairly and will serve as a valuable tool for vendors and service providers seeking to improve how their deployments coexist with Wi-Fi networks”.

The Coexistence Test Plan includes a comprehensive set of test scenarios agreed on by industry as adequate to determine proper spectrum sharing.

The Wi-Fi Alliance said it encourages all LTE-U vendors and operators to use the test plan to ensure their LTE-U devices and network deployments coexist fairly with Wi-Fi.

The plan incorporates contributions from both the Wi-Fi and LTE-U communities.

The alliance’s statement said that coming to an industry-agreed solution “required compromises from all sides. Therefore, the test plan is designed to be used as an unedited whole.”

It added that alternate test approaches, such as “selectively omitting or modifying portions of the test plan”, would not have been acceptable “since those tactics will not provide assurances of fair coexistence”.

“Delivering a cross-industry coexistence testing solution was an unprecedented and difficult task, and the outcome will help ensure the billions of people who rely on Wi-Fi every day will continue to benefit from the same great user experience they have enjoyed for more than 15 years,” said Edgar Figueroa, president and CEO of the Wi-Fi Alliance.

“Wi-Fi connectivity underpins our daily lives, and Wi-Fi Alliance has an obligation to represent the needs of Wi-Fi users worldwide.”

The alliance said it is not seeking regulatory mandates for coexistence.

The organisation is now encouraging LTE-U vendors to “test every LTE-U device against the entire Coexistence Test Plan, as it is the best way to demonstrate that LTE-U products share spectrum fairly.”

Image courtesy Wi-Fi Alliance.