METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR REAL TIME CELLULAR NETWORK CONFIGURATION

• US 20040203459A1
• Filed: 11/04/2002
• Published: 10/14/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 11/04/2002
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Telcordia Technologies Incorporated (Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson)
• Original Assignee: Telcordia Technologies Incorporated (Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson)
• Inventors: White, Robert, Borras-Chia, Joan, Wilkes, Joseph, Lemberg, Howard
• Granted Patent: US 6,832,074 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 455/67.13
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 16/02 Resource partitioning among network components, e.g. reuse partitioning
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/02 Arrangements for optimising operational condition
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/10 Scheduling measurement reports ; Arrangements for measurement reports
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/0453 Resources in frequency domain, e.g. a carrier in FDMA
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/541 using the level of interference
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 72/542 using measured or perceived quality

Abstract

A method and system for automatically configuring the frequency allocation within a cellular system or network. The method requires the collection of measurements from different parts of a cellular network, generating statistics from these measurements, and combining these statistics with inventory, propagation and geographic data. The combined data is used as input to a frequency allocation algorithm. As a result, the allocation algorithm produces a frequency configuration set, a quality measure of the configuration proposed and/or a set of recommendations that is fed back to the cellular base stations to re-allocate the frequency usage in a plurality of cells.

Claims

1. A method for configuring a cellular telecommunications network, comprising the steps of:

collecting measurements of one or more of a plurality of parameters measured at a plurality of mobile stations;

reporting of these measurements to cellular base stations;

forwarding of these measurements from said base stations via an element manager to a remote centralized server;

combining said measurements from one of more base stations into a quality parameter for the plurality of base stations; and

choosing at said centralized server new parameters to be implemented at each base station that result in an optimized performance across said plurality of base stations.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein said parameter measurements are measurements of frequency interference.

3. The method in accordance to claim 2 wherein said new parameters implemented in said base stations are selected frequency allocations.

4. A method for determining an optimum frequency allocation for a wireless telecommunications network having at least one base station in a serving area, and comprising the steps of:

measuring at a mobile station the level of interference in a first frequency from all other frequencies received by said mobile station;

reporting said measurements to a centralized server;

comparing said measured interference levels at one frequency to all other frequencies measured at said mobile station; and

selecting from said measured frequencies a different frequency to be allocated for each of said base station to minimize the overall interference measurement at all said mobile stations.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the frequency to be optimized is the beacon frequency of the base station.

6. The method of claim 4 wherein the selecting step is comprised of the steps of:

first finding a local optimum frequency for said base station; and

finding a global optimum from said system from the local optimum frequencies selected.

7. The method of claim 4 wherein the frequencies to be optimized are the transmitter channel frequencies.

8. A computer server comprising:

means for receiving performance data from a plurality of cellular radio base stations;

means for storing said performance data;

means for using said performance data for determining new cellular system parameters that improve cellular system performance; and

means for communicating said new cellular system parameters to said plurality of cellular radio base stations.

9. The server of claim 8 wherein said performance data are measured the received signal strength indication for each transmitter frequency.

10. The server of claim 9 wherein said performance data are calculated interference measures for each transmitter frequency based on said received signal strength indication values.

11. The server of claim 10 wherein said new cellular system parameters are the frequency allocations used by said plurality of cellular base stations.

14. The server of claim 10 wherein said means of means for using said performance data for determining new cellular system parameters that improve cellular system performance implements the method claimed in claim 13.

12. A method of allocating frequencies in a cellular telecommunications system comprising the steps of:

receiving from a plurality of mobile terminals the measured received signal strength indicator for each frequency available for use by such mobile stations across a plurality of cellular base stations;

calculating a value representing the interference level for each frequency available for use in each of said transceivers in said cellular base stations;

selecting, at random, one transceiver;

identifying a frequency with the lowest calculated interference level value for said selected transceiver;

determining whether said identified frequency is an allocated frequency for said selected transceiver and if it is making said identified frequency the new allocated frequency; and

repeating said identifying and determining steps for said each transceiver in said plurality of stations.

13. The method of claim 12 where said calculating step is further comprised of the steps of:

calculating a first interference level value at a transceiver for one of said available frequencies caused by all other of said transceivers in said cells from which measurements have been reported;

calculating a second interference level value caused by said transceiver at all other transceivers for said one frequency;

summing the first and second interference level values to create a total interference level value for said one frequency; and

repeating said calculating a first interference level value, said calculating a second interference level value and said summing steps for each of said available frequencies.

15. A computer program product comprising a computer readable program code means for causing a computer to:

receive from a plurality of mobile terminals the measured received signal strength indicator for each frequency available for use by such mobile stations across a plurality of cellular base stations;

calculate a value representing the interference level for each frequency available for use in each of said transceivers in said cellular base stations;

store said values in computer memory;

select, at random, one transceiver;

identify a frequency with the lowest calculated interference level value for said selected transceiver;

determine whether said identified frequency is an allocated frequency for said selected transceiver and if it is making said identified frequency the new allocated frequency; and

repeat said identifying and determining steps for said each transceiver in said plurality of stations.

16. The computer program product of claim 15 where in said computer readable program code means for causing a computer to calculate a value representing the interference level for each frequency available further comprising program code to:

calculate a first interference level value at a transceiver for one of said available frequencies caused by all other of said transceivers in said cells from which measurements have been reported;

calculate a second interference level value caused by said transceiver at all other transceivers for said one frequency;

sum the first and second interference level values to create a total interference level value for said one frequency; and

repeat the process of calculating a first interference level value, calculating a second interference level value and summing such values for each of said available frequencies.