Enhancing Uplink Performance of NR RedCap in Industrial 5G/B5G Systems

The evolution of cellular fifth-generation (5G) tech-nologies shapes the future of the manufacturing industry by enabling sector automation and digitalization. Smart factories rely primarily on wireless connectivity provided by new radio (NR) systems to meet the stringent requirements of industrial applications. Among these, several industrial wearable and sensor-based services involve devices with relaxed communication capabilities as compared to Rel-15 NR user equipment. Hence, a new category of reduced-capability (RedCap) devices becomes essential in industrial private networks. As RedCap devices may experience degradation of uplink (UL) performance due to simplifications in radio frequency and baseband capabilities, this paper focuses on enhancing NR RedCap operations with existing 5G solutions for UL improvement, namely, dual connectivity, carrier aggregation, and supplementary UL. Specifically, we discuss these options for RedCap wearable devices and evaluate the performance gains of the selected technology using link-level simulations.