Benoist Sebire

Dual connectivity for LTE small cell evolution: functionality and performance aspects

DC is one of the most important features introduced in Release 12 of the 3GPP specifications. DC aims at increasing the per-user throughput by improving the utilization of radio resources across two base stations connected via non-ideal backhaul (X2) and operating on different carrier frequencies. By making it possible to maintain the connection to the primary cell located in the macro base station while accessing the extra capacity provided by the small cell layer, DC can also improve the mobility performance in small cell deployments. This article gives an overview of the DC feature as standardized in Release 12. We summarize the supported scenarios and the DC functionality, and also demonstrate by means of detailed system-level simulations how DC can improve end-user throughput and mobility performance.