Carrier Aggregation • IMS Fusion • Robust multimode • Global roaming • Memory less solution • Compact radio
Wider frequency spectrum bandwidth gives higher throughput. Normally, a mobile device only uses one (frequency) carrier in one band at a time. More bandwidth can be obtained by combining carriers from two bands, or within the same band – in other words Carrier Aggregation. Carrier Aggregation gives an increased effective bandwidth for a user through the use of radio resources across multiple carriers.
VoLTE (Voice over LTE) is the telephony service for LTE. It is based on IMS (IP Multimedia Subsystem) that provides support for services such as file transfer, presence and video alongside the voice call. IMS Fusion merges the IMS registrations from all IMS services in the mobile device into one common IMS registration to the SIP proxy server. This makes it possible to support an arbitrary number of downloaded or pre-installed IMS apps.
The latest Thor modems are all based on a new architecture concept. They have been designed from ground up to be extraordinary flexible in terms of handling existing and future Radio Access Technologies (RATs), and to provide efficient execution and robust multimode of all 3GPP RATs.
Even though we are converging to a global standard with LTE (FDD/TDD), the network market is still fragmented and the allocated frequency bands depend on region and the available access technology. Including support for all possible bands is usually not an option when designing a mobile device, means have to be taken to combat the band-increase without sacrificing global roaming.
A Thor modem can operate without its own flash memory.
In a standard mobile device design, both the host application processor and the modem have their own flash memory dies. To cut hardware costs, and to be able to further down-size the final design on PCB, it is possible to set-up the Thor modem to execute in flashless mode.
In such a solution, the modem shares flash memory with the host device application processor. The modem code will at boot be loaded from the external flash memory and loaded into the modem's RAM, from which the final boot of the modem is being made.
Thanks to the high integration, only a few components need to be added in the RF front-end to get support of up to eight bands. The radio transceiver’s particularly low noise levels mean also that no interstage filters are needed in HSPA+ and LTE bands.
This means only a very small PCB area will be occupied by the modem. The low component count means also savings in production costs.