Optimizing HSDPA performance in the UMTS network planning process

With HSDPA design and specification now being finished, the HSDPA will be ready for deployment in the very near future. While theoretical HSDPA performance has thoroughly been investigated, one of the major tasks of WCDMA network operators, the embedding of the HSDPA into their Release 99 network planning and optimization workflow, has rarely been treated so far. Consequently this paper presents and discusses a process and a toolset to find an optimal performance balance between Release 99 services and the HSDPA. Especially the availability of necessary input values for this process was noted in the process design, since, for example, traffic maps are usually not reliably available in the planning phase. Thus, for the first time the capacity of Release 99 services and the Release 5 HSDPA are jointly elaborated within one workflow and possible trade offs are pinpointed to. Hereby we concentrate on a discussion of the workflow rather than on presenting concrete planning results for a sample scenario.