PICO cell introduced in 4G-LTE, overcoming the COVERAGE ISSUES

With the advancement in mobile technology and introduction of wide spectrum modulation 4G has open door with high through-put (data rate) over air interface. The one flaws which was faced initially while implementation of LTE was the coverage issues, this is because of the higher frequency band used in LTE.

Although the higher frequency band used in LTE, has reduced the RF antenna size and are also less prone to environmental interference but are with one drawback of- less coverage because of lower wavelength. This issue can be resolved by increasing the power at the BS (base station) feed to the antenna but this will be helpful only at the DL (down Link) end of the receiver (the user equipment) UE. But at UE end it’s really hard for the hardware to increase the power UL (up link). This way air-interface is limited in coverage. Many solutions were made to get higher coverage like: repeaters and more BS. Repeaters are cost- effective solution but are again BS dependent, More BS will increase coverage problem but RF-planning will become more complex and this solution is even not cost-effective.

Afterwards PICO-CELL concept was introduced, according to this in a particular area with lot of MICRO-CELL and MACRO-CELL BS if the coverage problem arises then PICO-CELL will be placed to add coverage. This technique has reduced number of MICRO-CELL BS and eventually reduced the network planning cost.