Nokia has updated its AirScale 5G radio range with its latest generation of ReefShark chips. The products include baseband, remote radio heads and massive MIMO active antennas with digital beamforming, and roll-outs are already underway.
The ReefShark-powered AirScale massive MIMO antennas are available as both 32TRX and 64TRX, along with 8T8R remote radio heads. The 32TRX claims to be the industry’s lightest, at 17kg, while supporting high bandwidth (200 MHz occupied bandwidth and 400 MHz instantaneous bandwidth) and delivering high power output. Both the new 32TRX and the new 64TRX massive MIMO antennas support fragmented spectrum and network sharing cases.
The new baseband plug-in cards boost the capacity of the AirScale System Module. The new ReefShark-powered plug-in cards deliver up to eight times more throughput and serve up to eight times more cells compared to previous generations. Nokia said the baseband module can support 90,000 connected users simultaneously and has 84 Gbps throughput, while reducing power consumption by up to 75 percent.
In addition, Nokia Single RAN software now includes 5G, helping to accelerate 5G roll-outs and reduce costs. The combination of Nokia’s Single RAN software and the new baseband plug-in cards offer multi-mode (2G, 3G, 4G, 5G) and multi-band, as well as supporting the latest fronthaul interfaces (eCPRI) on a single baseband platform.
Nokia said the AirScale baseband architecture is designed to be future-proof and support the increasing demands for wireless traffic. By keeping the L1 and L2 computing separate from L3 and transport baseband plug-in units, capacity can be added when and where it is needed in the network. Network modernization can be achieved by software upgrade or by adding new plug-in units into the existing baseband.
Furthermore, Nokia is integrating AI and ML features in the ReefShark platforms. The company said it is carrying out proof of concepts with customers this year in this area, for features such as massive MIMO beam pattern optimization, energy saving, advanced traffic steering, advanced packet scheduling, and alarm pattern discovery.
