5Gi

ADVANCE YOUR CAREER WITH 5G

5Gi
Introduction
● It is basically a Made in India standard created through a joint
collaboration between IIT Hyderabad and Chennai.

● The network standards has got approval from ITU (International

Telecommunications Union).

● Only three standards have gotten clearance from ITU.

● 5Gi offers more range at a lower frequency, which is the opposite of

5G.
Introduction
● 5Gi can work with lower-end spectrum bands, which would make it
more cost effective.

● 3GPP has discussed proposals including on Pi/2-BPSK specification

updates to enable the merger of 5Gi into 3GPP.
Status of Pi/2-BPSK
● It has been introduced in Rel-15 with optional filtering and power
boosting.

● The filtering has been left unspecified although the EVM definition
places certain bounds on allowed filter characteristics, including filter
group delay.

● In Rel-15, Pi/2-BPSK uses the legacy ZC DM-RS.

Status of Pi/2-BPSK
● In Rel-16, low PAPR DM-RS has also been introduced to match the low
PAPR of Pi/2-BPSK control or data.

● A separate 5Gi specification has also been created which is outside of

3GPP, in which Pi/2-BPSK is mandatory with certain other changes.
Requirements of merging 5Gi into 3GPP
● There are technical and logistical requirements for achieving a merge
of the two branches.
 Logistical Requirements
A possibly practical approach to carry out the merging of 5Gi into 3GPP
specifications would be to carry out the following steps, as per
recommendations:

● At RAN#94e, discuss an agreeable set of specification changes and

adjustments of the ongoing Rel-17 RAN4-led SI on Optimisations of
Pi/2- BPSK UL Power in NR that are seen facilitating the 5Gi merge into
3GPP, develop the corresponding set of SRs for Rel-17 and approve the
RAN4 project scope adjustments.
Logistical Requirements
● Technically endorse the Rel-17 CRs and postpone the final approval
and implementation of these CRs until a written commitment is
received from TSDSI on the merger of 5Gi into 3GPP and a committed
roadmap of pursuing merged 3GPP 5G specifications in India with no
further 5Gi updates in ITU-R.
Logistical Requirements
● Final approval of the Rel-17 CRs at the RAN plenary where such
communication is received, ideally by RAN#95e and no later than
RAN#96/RAN#96e. 3GPP will, at this time, communicate the merger to
ITU-R as part of periodic update.

● Do not hold up completion of 3GPP Rel-17 specification while the CRs

are on hold.
Logistical Requirements
● If the above steps are agreed, capture that fact in the RAN#94e
meeting summary, including a statement that this merger will
effectively allow 3GPP to better support the market in India with a
global cost-effective solution.
Backward compatibility & technical
Requirements
● An important decision point is the applicable release of the CRs.

● The possible choice would be Rel-17 applicability.

● It is important to formally approve the Rel-17 CRs by ideally RAN#95e

and no later than RAN#96/RAN#96e to avoid the fact that there will be
Rel-17 UEs before and after the CR, i.e UEs that have implemented the
change and UEs of the same release that have not.
Backward compatibility & technical
Requirements
● No signalling IE would be added or removed from the specifications.

● All changes are limited to how the UE is expected to set these existing
IEs.

● E.g, the ability to indicate different FR1 and FR2 capability would still
remain in the specification.
Relationship to power boosting
● An important aspect of Pi/2-BPSK is the possibility of power boosting
enabled by lower PAPR.

● The power boosting being made mandatory with capability signalling

is the Rel-16 version.
Transparent spectral shaping
● Both data and DMRS are filtered: The choice of filters is upto UE
implementations and transparent to the network.
Benefits of 5Gi
● 5Gi standard will allow telcos in the country to widen the 5G
connectivity net to villages.

● It is also said to be cost-effective as a technology, which can be

beneficial if implemented at a large scale by the operators in the
country.
Benefits of 5Gi
● The rural network has always lagged behind the urban setup, but 5Gi
can make sure there is no lag between the advancement of 5Gi in
cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and rural parts of the country.

● 5G promise fast internet connectivity but also helps in improving

mobile coverage.
Challenges of 5Gi
● The implementation of 5Gi will be challenging for the telecom
operators in the country.

● Telecom operators have spent millions on upgrading their network to

offer 5G connectivity.

● Now the country is considering switching to 5Gi, a local standard.

Challenges of 5Gi
● So eventually, if India decides to go with 5Gi as its default network
standard, this could become problematic for telcos.

● Their existing setup will have to be re-engineered to support the 5Gi

standard.

● The cellular operations Authority of India believes that moving from 5G

to 5Gi will be cost-intensive
5Gi
● 5Gi was developed in the hope of expanding 5G coverage in rural
India by using a unique feature called LMLC (Low Mobility Large Cell)
which significantly enhances the signal transmission range of a base
station for a service provider.

● The basic difference between 5Gi and the global 5G standard is that
5Gi is designed to work on bands lower than the range of 5G bands.
5Gi
● The global range standards for 5G networks are between 700 MHz and
52,000 MHz, there may be some sacrifice of range of connectivity at
higher bands.

● Bands are divided as low frequency bands (< 1GHz), medium

frequency bands (1 GHz-6 GHz) and high frequency bands (> 6GHz).

● Mobile service providers in India have regularly referred to the 1.8 GHz
and 2.1 GHz bands for coverage.
5Gi
● The 5Gi networks work on lower bands on the spectrum, the idea being
to offer a wider coverage area with every 5G transmitter.

● The 5Gi technology that is being tested works on the Low Mobility
Large Cell method, with a cell based transmit waveform to increase
the range.
5Gi
● The telecommunications standards development society,India has
said “ Enhanced cell converge enabled by this standard, will be of
great value in countries and regions that rely heavily on mobile
technologies for connectivity that cannot afford dense deployment of
base stations due to the lack of deep fibre penetration, poor
economics and challenges of geographical terrain”.
5Gi
● This is basically to push mobile connectivity in rural areas as well as
offer better coverage in high-density areas where network load and
therefore slower than usual mobile data speeds.