On the System-level Performance of Coordinated Multi-point Transmission Schemes in 5G NR Deployment Scenarios

TL;DR

This paper evaluates the system-level performance of CoMP schemes like DPS and NC-JT in 5G NR deployments, highlighting conditions where NC-JT offers advantages and how system load impacts gains.

Contribution

It provides a comparative analysis of DPS and NC-JT in various deployment scenarios using advanced simulations, revealing when NC-JT is beneficial.

Findings

NC-JT offers no significant gains over DPS in macro-cell deployments with many antennas.

NC-JT benefits are more evident in indoor scenarios with fewer antenna ports.

System load increases reduce NC-JT gains due to higher interference and lower transmission rank.

Abstract

This paper investigates the system-level performance of dynamic point selection (DPS) and non-coherent joint transmission (NC-JT) coordinated multi-point transmission (CoMP) schemes under different 5G NR deployment scenarios using state-of-the-art system-level simulations. It is observed that at a mid-band carrier frequency, NC-JT does not provide performance gains over DPS or single transmission/reception point (TRP) transmission unless the channel from a TRP is rank deficient. Therefore, benefits with NC-JT are more likely to be found in indoor deployment scenarios where the TRPs are typically equipped with only 2 transmit antenna ports, whereas benefits are less likely to be observed in macro-cell deployments where TRPs typically have a larger number of antennas ports. It is further observed that NC-JT gains tend to diminish with increasing system load, partly due to increased interference, which typically lowers the transmission rank.