LTE Unlicensed

This chapter presents principles of the long‐term evolution (LTE) unlicensed operation which is being worked in third generation partnership project (3GPP) under the name license assisted access (LAA) for Release 13. The use of LAA allows benefiting from the additional capacity available from the unlicensed spectrum. The chapter introduces first the 5 GHz frequency band under consideration with the key regulatory requirements to be considered and then covers the motivation for using LTE in unlicensed spectrum and the LTE unlicensed operation principles. Next, it addresses the unlicensed band‐specific coexistence issues as well as the relative performance in terms of achievable capacity and coverage of LAA for LTE compared to using Wi‐Fi in the 5 GHz band, including the performance when coexisting with Wi‐Fi on the same channel. The chapter finally covers 3GPP standardization plans and expected schedule.