The innovative Rohde & Schwarz concept for testing integrated joint communications and sensing (JCAS) shown at the Mobile World Congress 2023 received a Global TD-LTE Initiative (GTI) Award. Equipped with the R&S AREG800A object simulator and R&S FE44S external frontends, is a completely new lab test platform for JCAS technology verification. The GTI Award acknowledges industrial achievement and success in 4G evolution and 5G development across a wide range of market segments.

The GTI Award is granted by the GTI, which consists of leading global operators and has successfully helped commercialize TD-LTE networks and services. The Innovative Breakthrough in Mobile Technology Award is given to technologies based on how they meet GTI operator needs, as well as their innovativeness, benefits, market potential, sustainability and impact.

Joint or integrated communications and sensing (JCAS/ICAS) is one of many 6G research fields around the world. JCAS/ICAS may enhance existing applications, such as those in the automotive industry, or create new use cases in data communications and environmental sensing. JCAS can also detect, track, identify and create images of objects, events or the surroundings to improve communications performance. Overall efficiency is greatly improved since communications and sensors use the same spectrum and the signals are transmitted and received by the same hardware.

The award-winning Rohde & Schwarz testing solution enables object emulation within the FR2 frequency band (a frequency band of interest) by combining an R&S®AREG800A automotive radar echo generator with an R&S FE44S external frontend. The test setup presented at the Mobile World Congress included signal generators along with signal and spectrum analyzers to demonstrate and visualize the system’s cutting-edge JCAS testing capabilities. The R&S AREG800A can simulate dynamic targets with various distances, sizes with radar cross sections and radial velocities to verify the ability of the JCAS-enabled devices under test to precisely locate a target object. The solution enables reliable and repeatable lab testing for an objective comparison of various JCAS approaches, accelerating JCAS research and development and preparing it for industrialization.

The GTI Award was presented at the GTI Summit during the Mobile World Congress 2023 in Barcelona.