Low Cost Broadband Antenna with SDMA Capability for Next Generation PCS Base Stations

Following the demands of modern society for more mobility and more information, future generation base stations have to provide more data transmission capacity requiring a flexible management of the resources code, time, bandwidth and space. The air interface and hence the antenna is of significance for bandwidth and space, because the RF-performance of the antenna limits the performance of any used algorithm. In this contribution a broadband PCS antenna concept based on a low cost stacked patch approach is presented. The manufactured single element shows a ¿14 dB bandwidth of 15.9% and is dedicated to the established PCS 1800 system extending to the the DECT frequencies. The crucial part of the base station array antenna, the 1×8 element column array, is composed of dual±45° polarized single elements. Within the 13.9% bandwidth of the array (¿14 dB) the measured cross-polarization is below ¿16.5 dB over all angles in both principal planes. An additionally developed broadband electronically controlled beam forming network enables measurements with different geometrical array setups.