Latency analysis of LTE network for M2M applications

Smart Grid companies are looking for communication infrastructure to support remote control, automation, and monitoring. But, these companies are not fully confident in budding LTE technology for M2M (Machine-to-Machine) applications, although it has been proved to be a promising technology for H2H (Human-to-Human) communications. LTE MTC (Machine Type Communications) is a part of the upcoming release 13 of the global 3GPP standard. The reliability, pervasiveness, efficiency, and mature ecosystem of LTE make it the major candidate to support M2M applications in the future. However, in LTE MTC, power enhanced power modes are used to extend the battery life in the cost of increased latency. Since M2M requirements are more towards low throughput and low latency applications, it is necessary to investigate the performance of commercial LTE network in terms of latency. This paper presents the results of a latency measurement campaign done in commercial LTE networks in different coverage conditions. This paper is expected to provide utility companies a foresight about the feasibility of the public LTE networks to support delay sensitive applications. Moreover, necessary optimizations required from network operator side to support M2M applications are also discussed in this paper.