Cost comparison of Licensed Shared Access (LSA) and MIMO scenarios for capacity growth in Finland

The high mobile data traffic growth requires investments in radio access networks. Network capacity expansion can be achieved by increasing the number of base stations, increasing the network spectral efficiency and obtaining additional spectrum. This study assumes a constant number of base station to compare two potential future network deployment scenarios; the Licensed Shared Access scenario (LSA), which adds spectrum to the network and a Multi-Input and Multi-Output (4x2 MIMO) antenna technology, which increases the network’s spectral efficiency. Both deployment scenarios are studied for the urban regions in Finland. The purpose is to examine the spectrum availability and evaluate under which conditions LSA is more likely to be implemented in the Finnish market. With the assumptions taken, the results show that the LSA scenario provides more capacity but the MIMO scenario provides a more cost efficient alternative. The MIMO technology is preferable than a LSA deployment for mobile data traffic growth rate less than 2.7. For larger growth rate (up to 3.5) the LSA scenario is a feasible solution either as independent or complementary technique.