Lecture Series in Mobile Telecommunications and Networks (1583KB)

Of course, it is not just one mask, but you are talking about a network here, collectively – the nodes of the network,
creating a mask that is co-existing with something next to it. This is the way that we need to think, more from a
network perspective rather than an individual perspective. By this, I do not mean a network perspective as my network,
or the Vodafone network, or a different network with their nodes, but I mean it in terms of neighbouring networks.
You have seen much work in the area of cognitive networks,
where it is not just about making a decision at the individual
node level, but it is making a decision at what they call a
multilateral level, where all sorts of nodes have to interact
with each other and come to a distributed but agreed
answer or decision. If you think of this as a multiple network,
starting with that cube diagram, co-existing next to each
other and having some small level of collaboration, you can
begin to think how perhaps these more dynamic masks, more dynamic standards, come into being.
Another way to think of this dynamism, going back to the blocks again, if spectrum users, co-existing side by side with
each other, these spectrum users can begin dynamically to introduce self-imposed guidelines. In this you are saying, if I
am using this spectrum and I use a certain kind of technology – very advanced technology that can be close to the
signal, and I can most efficiently use the spectrum I want, I might only have to have a small guard bands, whereas if I sit
in this space and I want to use older, more static technology, then I can have big guard bands and I can discard them
without caution and I am willing to give up my spectrum
efficiency for that. So again, you are taking away the
decision from on high and you are pushing it down to the
people who are actually deciding on what technology to use.
You can go further than that, and this is where the notion of
bargaining begins to come in. You can think about entities
that co-exist or are neighbours, bargaining with each other.
Obviously, there are payments and various different things
that come into play with this. For example, if these two
neighbours do not co-operate and this one has to use a big
chunk of guard bands and that one uses a small amount of
guard bands, there could be some way to allow bargaining
to happen. So it allows this person or entity to encroach on
your spectrum but overall it will increase the usable
spectrum and obviously, entity B needs some kind of reward
for you allowing them to approach their spectrum which, over time, will be hard cash.
When I first looked at this, I wondered whether this was an unreasonable level of negotiation and collaboration or coordination
to expect between two potentially hugely competing entities, that are side by side. However, when I
stepped back, if you think now about the way, for example, a lot of mobile companies share the tower structures for
their base stations, and technology now, it is just as well that different companies can actually share the base stations if
they so choose. I am sure that the decline in that level of sharing would not have been envisaged – it would be
contrary to the way that people think about how you would do business with a competitor. Thinking in this kind of
neighbouring, collaborative and co-ordinating way, where bargaining might happen, after you set up an initial base
system, is not beyond the realistic way of thinking.
To summarise all of that and put it into context we can look at the next few slides. In In this slide a target economic
service area is depicted. You then specify the technology you will use and do some spectrum planning and you decide
that, the package of spectrum rights you want will need to be a little bigger than the target economic area allowing for
the effects of the technology. If you use smart smart sensing and sculpting of technology you may not need to buy
that much in excess of the target area but if you use more limited technologies you may want to err of the side of
caution. So the choice is the spectrum consumers. So it is a different perspective but certainly the kinds of technology
that we have and that we can see emerging are contributing to making this kind of approach more realistic.
32 The Royal Academy of Engineering