AbstractMobile broadband networks will face a tremendous growth in data traffic demand over the next 20 years. A key requirement for the evolution of radio access networks is the increase in the amount of spectrum and optimized spectrum usage, in order to meet future service demands. More efficient spectrum use will come with evolving technology features and novel spectrum sharing models. Candidates for technology improvements are higher order and massive MIMO systems, cooperative base stations and CoMP techniques, highly optimized resource allocation algorithms, network densification with inter-cell interference management and highly flexible carrier aggregation techniques to extend spectrum. In this paper, we will highlight carrier aggregation combined with flexible spectrum assignment and use of spectrum databases following novel licensing schemes. We give an overview of LSA activities, present a 3CA demonstration platform enabling the LSA concept and discuss its implementation constraints.
