This paper focuses on analyzing some key business aspects that arise during the deployment of key novel enabling technologies for 5G systems. Results are taken out of two EU-funded ongoing research projects, namely 5G-MiEdge and Superfluidity, which largely exploit mmWave communications and softwarization concepts for 5G networks. We initially provide a stakeholder analysis of the 5G ecosystem, as well as a Strengths Weaknesses Opportunities Threats (SWOT) analysis of a couple of key and most promising 5G use cases. For one use case also a preliminary business model is provided. Then we detail an economic 5G cost model, which is able to provide indications on the profitability of 5G networks. Finally, we highlight the planned future works.

Energy efficiency is one of main challenges for the evolution of mobile networks. Many solutions have been already proposed by literature studies, and one promising technique is given by selective switch OFF schemes applied to booster cells in presence of a coverage layer. This mechanism permits to save energy by dynamically switching off redundant cells in conditions of low traffic, while maintaining the minimum QoS requested in the network. Nevertheless, in order to evaluate the real gains achievable by the operator in terms of decrease in energy consumption, these theoretical solutions should be implemented in a real network; from this point of view, ON-OFF algorithms in literature often result not suitable for a real implementation because of practical constraints and hardware capabilities of commercial equipment. The real performances of a selective switch OFF scheme have been assessed in a test bench with real eNodeB LTE in an opportune scenario of interest and with commercial terminals. Achieved gains obtained in high traffic conditions are encouraging also to open research activity in order to have future sustainable mobile communication systems.

TIM (Telecom Italia Mobile) and CSELT (the research centre of the Telecom Italia group), in co-operation with Ericsson, are performing an experimental evaluation of UMTS (Universal Mobile Telecommunications System), a proposal for the IMT-2000 family of third generation mobile radio systems. In particular, the trial has been focused on the FDD (frequency division duplexing) component of UMTS, based on a wideband direct sequence CDMA access technique. The aim of the trial is to study the characteristics of the system, as far as the radio and network aspects are concerned, with reference to some UMTS services.

We refer to the possible performance improvement consequent to the introduction of dynamic carrier allocation (DCA) strategies in the pan-European Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) cellular network. The impact of the introduction in a real network of two of the more promising DCA strategies is assessed, also in terms of the entailed signalling exchanges between base stations. A performance evaluation of a realistic cellular network exploiting the above-mentioned DCA strategies is carried out, taking into account all the main GSM transmission and network aspects. The simulations have been performed by considering a realistic cell layout corresponding to the urban area of Rome, its realistic propagation environment, and an user mobility model based on the building percentages in such area. The results of the performance evaluation show that, by carefully choosing the values of the parameters characterizing each of the considered DCA strategies, a conspicuous increase in the number of users supported by the cellular network can be achieved.

We refer to the implementation and the performance of a specific class of dynamic carrier allocation (DCA) strategies which is suitable for being introduced in the pan-European Global System for Mobile communications (GSM) cellular network. One of the main concerns of this work is to verify if and to what extent strategies belonging to this class can offer better performance than fixed channel allocation (FCA) in realistic traffic and propagation conditions. The impact of the introduction in a real network of two of the more promising DCA strategies in the considered class is assessed. In particular, solutions are presented concerning the signaling exchanges entailed by the implementation of each of the considered DCA strategies. A performance evaluation of a realistic cellular network exploiting the above-mentioned DCA strategies is carried out, taking into account all of the main GSM transmission and network aspects. The simulations have been performed by considering a realistic cell layout corresponding to the urban area of Rome, its realistic propagation environment, and a user mobility model based on the building percentages in such an area. The results of the performance evaluation show that, by carefully choosing the values of the parameters characterizing each of the considered DCA strategies, a conspicuous increase in the number of users supported by the cellular network can be achieved.

The paper presents the performance of a simulcast digital radio paging system, computed and measured in the presence of both additive white Gaussian noise (AWGN) and Rayleigh fading plus AWGN. A number of combinations of time delay, frequency offset, amplitude imbalance among the signals are considered. The results presented have been utilized for contributing to the definition of ERMES, the new European radio message system.>

This paper deals with the problem of frequency reuse in cellular systems. In mobile radio communications systems using fixed channel allocation the radio frequency channels in the allowed band are assigned to different coverage cells according to a frequency plan devised as a trade-off between quality and capacity. This balance may become very crucial, especially if, as it is often said, the cluster size can assume only certain values, namely 1, 3, 4, 7, 9, 22, etc. It is shown that the cluster size can actually assume any of the integer values which are generally not considered and, besides, more solutions usually exist for a given cluster size.>

A number of continuous-phase modulation methods suitable for digital and mobile radio applications has been grouped in a common class, which has been named 12PM3 (12-state, phase modulation with correlation over three consecutive bits). This paper introduces the definition of this class of modulation schemes, and presents some of its features. With reference to the scheme that gives the best spectral compactness, some effects of typical implementation imperfections of the modulation circuits are discussed. The performance of some 12PM3 modulators associated with a frequency discrimination receiver is then computed with reference to both AWGN (additive white Gaussian noise) channels and the typical propagation conditions envisaged for SCPC/FDMA digital land mobile radio systems in urban environment. The adopted pre and postdiscrimination filters of the receiver are optimized for the best performance. Different decision techniques are considered, namely 2-TH (2-threshold), 4-TH, mixed 2-TH/4-TH and MLSE (maximum-likelihood sequence estimation) techniques.