Nokia Networks, STC demonstrates TDD-FDD aggregation with commercial chipset in Middle East & Africa

Nokia Networks and Saudi Telecom Company (STC), the largest and leading telecom operator in Saudi Arabia, announced today the successful demonstration of TDD-FDD Carrier Aggregation, the first with a commercial chipset in Middle East and Africa.

The demonstration, carried out using a new band combination of FDD 1800 MHz and TDD 2300 MHz, sets a benchmark for operators to optimally use their scarce spectrum resources and significantly improve LTE mobile broadband network capacity, coverage and speed. Carrier aggregation allows operators to create larger, virtual carrier bandwidths for services by combining separate spectrum bands, thus boosting capacity and speed as well as performance in the network.

Carrier aggregation benefits Combination of 1800 and 2300 MHz bands provide higher speed in larger areas High frequency bands have limited uplink coverage, but operators can significantly extend TDD coverage with TDD-FDD carrier aggregation with no additional changes to the network Load balancing between TDD- and FDD-LTE networks ensures the best coverage and speed for all subscribers in both networks Abdullah Alzmame, vice president, Networks, STC, said: “We have a strong track record with Nokia: Early this year we launched carrier aggregation on the TDD layer, doubling available throughput for our customers. In 2011, we provided commercial service on a TD-LTE network which now covers most of the Saudi population. With this new achievement, we enter the next level to improve speeds for consumers.”

Hani Dib, head of STC customer team at Nokia Networks, said: “We believe that the optimal use of spectrum is key to satisfy ever-increasing subscriber demand for network capacity and speed. Our achievement with STC will encourage other operators globally to look at this kind of spectrum convergence to save costs and increase throughput. ”