3D beamforming trials with an active antenna array

Beamforming techniques for mobile wireless communication systems like LTE using multiple antenna arrays for transmission and reception to increase the signal-to-noise-and-interference ratio (SINR) are state of the art. The increased SINR is not only due to a larger gain in the direction of the desired user, but also due to a better control of the spatial distribution of interference in the cell. To further enhance the system performance not only the horizontal, but also the vertical dimension can be exploited for beam pattern adaptation, thus giving an additional degree of freedom for interference avoidance among adjacent cells. This horizontal and vertical beam pattern adaptation is also referred to as 3D beamforming in the following. This paper describes investigations of the potential of 3D beamforming with lab and field trial setups and provides initial performance results.