A framework for UMTS air interface analysis

An integrated approach is presented for uplink and downlink air interface capacity evaluation and traffic analysis for the multiservice Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS). Within this framework the effects of both soft handoff (SHO) and fast power control (FPC) are considered. The canonical capacity of any given service, defined as the maximum number of concurrent users of that service, is derived; and the network total load is described as a function of this parameter and the number of concurrent users. The concept of virtual slots is defined within this integrated framework to obtain an accurate estimate for the blocking probability of each service type. A number of case studies are also presented to compare the results of utilizing the proposed framework with the results of network simulation. This comparison demonstrates the accuracy and usefulness of the proposed approach for network design and dimensioning.