5G NR & NB-IoT L1 IPs, Software and Design Services for NTN with Beamforming and Open RAN Radios

RF DSP Inc provides conformance-tested optimized high-performance 5G NR and IoT Physical Layer (L1) IPs, software and design services to enable our customers to quickly bring winning 5G NR NTN gNB and O-RAN products and solutions to the market. Our 5G NR low PHY and DFE for NTN is part of the Lockheed Martin LEO Regenerative gNB that is in the Shortlist of the GLOMO 2024 Best NTN Solution Award.

RF DSP’s 5G NR low PHY IP and DFE designs are optimized for NTN-specific requirements supporting:

  • Large number of simultaneous beams and high subscriber density
  • FR1 L-band and S-band, and FR2 Ka and Ku bands
  • Real-time mapping of carriers/data streams to beams
  • Intelligent management of multiple simultaneous beams at the same frequency to maximize spectral efficiency
  • Advanced Massive MIMO Hybrid Beamforming algorithms optimized for NTN channel models
  • Digital Front-End (DFE) designs for NTN specific beamforming configurations, power and channel conditions
  • Reference design and API for PHY and DFE configuration and management
  • Optimized for AMD Versal AI and Gen 4 RFSoC DFE chips (ZU67/65)

O-RAN RU IPs, M-Plane Software and System Development Environment (SDE)

AMD RFSOC Product Line Manager David Brubaker demonstrates RF DSP’s O-RU IP in an O-RAN Conformance Test Setup Using Viavi TM-500 O-DU Emulator and Rohde & Schwartz RF Test Equipment
Hardware setup of RF DSP’s O-RU IP in an O-RAN Conformance Test

RF DSP offers O-RAN Radio Unit (O-RU) IP cores that implements the low PHY baseband functions of the eNB/gNB base station and 7.2x split eCPRI/O-RAN fronthaul interface with an O-RAN Distributed Unit (O-DU) which implements the high PHY. This O-RU IP includes:

  • O-RAN fronthaul eCPRI/RoE over IP and UDP, supporting 2T2R to 64T 64R massive MIMO.
  • Multiple bands and component carriers, mixed numerology, optional carrier combining with NR + LTE+, LTE-M/NB-IoT and NR mixed numerology support, all with real-time C-plane control.
  • FFT/IFFT and PRACH U-plane processing, IQ compression and decompression (block floating point, block scaling and mu-law, static or dynamic), optional beamforming, optional O-RAN Category B.
  • Embedded software processing of PTP 1588 messages and S-plane reference designs.
  • Packet classification of M-plane messages and API to M-plane software.
  • IQ interfaces: to Ethernet fronthaul, DUC/DDC and RF transceivers
  • Processor interface: for M-plane external CPU processing
  • Radio clock interface: 100Hz radio frame clock input. Optional 100Hz radio frame clock output from the S-plane reference hardware circuit.
  • Optional features and extension types, design services for customization and porting available

O-RAN PHY Layer End-to-End System Development Environment for MIMO O-RUs and O-DUs

A System-Level O-RAN CUSM-Plane Development Environment for Massive MIMO and Small Cell RUs Using Xilinx RFSoC or FPGA + RF Transceivers

Real-Time Physical Layer and Link Layer End-to-End 3GPP and O-RAN Conformance Development Environment for Faster Time-To-Market