5G Americas published a report showing how 5G cellular can be used to for Vehicle-to-Everything (V2X) communications. The white paper is titled V2X Cellular Solutions that details new connected car opportunities for the cellular and automotive industries.
V2X solutions enable the exchange of information between vehicles and much more — people (V2P), such as bicyclists and pedestrians for alerts, vehicles (V2V) for collision avoidance, infrastructure (V2I) such as roadside devices for timing and prioritization, and the network (V2N) for real time traffic routing and other cloud travel services.
The goal of V2X is to improve road safety, increase the efficiency of traffic, reduce environmental impacts and provide additional traveler information services.
“LTE cellular technology can be an important enabler for a best-in-class vehicle connectivity solution,” stated Chris Pearson, President of 5G Americas. “A global LTE footprint and technology standards, combined with future-proof evolution, are enablers for Cellular V2X on the road to success in achieving the goals established for safety, information, ecology, maintenance and security, as well as entertainment, in the connected car of the future.”
The whitepaper describes the benefits that Cellular V2X (C-V2X) can provide to support the U.S. Department of Transportation objectives of improving safety and reducing vehicular crashes. Cellular V2X can also be instrumental in transforming the transportation experience by enhancing traveler and traffic information for societal goals.
The reports states that DSRC is not the only solution for V2X communications. LTE and fifth-generation (5G) cellular systems have the potential of supporting not only existing DSRC use cases, but also the more challenging and futuristic use cases that require low-latency, high reliability or high bandwidth. Cellular V2X could also could complement DSRC communications to enhance V2X communications capabilities.
The report also states:
DSRC has several limitations from a physical layer perspective. One of the main limitations is that it’s an asynchronous system.
Additional asynchronous-related disadvantage is that DSRC does not allow frequency division multiplexing (FDM) of transmissions, leading to significant reduction in link budget. The CSMA-CA protocol also forces inefficient spatial reuse due to fixed thresholds that are specified for sensing the carrier. The physical layer also has limitations of performance due to the lower coding gain used by convolutional codes. DSRC is based on Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM), which restricts maximum transmit power and hence range. All of these factors limit the performance of DSRC at the physical layer.
Chris Pearson added, “Cellular V2X will lead us into the future of a fully connected car experience. The vehicle can be supported by advanced services from the mobile network providing a safer, more efficient and enjoyable driving experience while having a positive impact on society.”
C-V2X is part of the 3GPP specifications in Release 14. 3GPP announced the completion of the initial C-V2X standard in September 2016. There is a robust evolutionary roadmap for C-V2X towards 5G with a strong ecosystem in place. C-V2X will be a key technology enabler for the safer, more autonomous vehicle of the future.
The whitepaper V2X Cellular Solutions was written by members of 5G Americas and is available for free download on the 5G Americas website. Co-leaders of the white paper working group are DeWayne Sennett of AT&T and Michaela Vanderveen of Qualcomm Technologies, Inc.
5G Americas is an industry trade organization compo
sed of leading telecommunications service providers and manufacturers.