FDD-TDD carrier aggregation marks 500Mbit/s milestone

Huawei and Vodafone have opened another chapter in the development and commercialisation of LTE-Advanced network technology by achieving a single user peak downlink speed of over 500Mbit/s, at this year's MWC. The demonstration involved an LTE Advanced FDD+TDD Convergence Carrier Aggregation solution, comprising three FDD carriers and one TDD carrier.

Carrier Aggregation combines multiple carriers to significantly improve utilisation of spectrum resources, peak user data rates and throughput. Vodafone currently has 800MHz, 1800MHz, and 2600MHz, a total of 50MHz spectrum bandwidth in FDD mode and 20MHz of 2600MHz in TDD mode in Spain. This record in FDD+TDD Carrier Aggregation technology is expected to boost Vodafone's network capacity in the country and enable the operator to have more flexibility in deploying 2CC and 3CC CA solutions in the future.

LTE-A FDD+TDD Carrier Aggregation was jointly developed by Vodafone and Huawei. The technology significantly improves utilisation of spectrum resources, increases peak user data rates and throughput, and reduces operator deployment and operation costs. It allows networks to meet bandwidth requirements of data-heavy applications.