Distributed Antenna Systems and MIMO Technology

With the explosive growth in wireless usage due in part to smart phones, tablet computers and a growing applications developer base, wireless operators are constantly looking for ways to increase the spectral efficiency of their networks. Multiple input/ multiple output (MIMO) technology, which made its first broad commercial appearance in 802.11n systems, is now gaining substantial momentum in Mobile Wireless Wide Area Network (Mobile WWAN) with the launch of WiMAX and LTE networks. MIMO is a key technology in these networks which substantially improves network throughput, capacity and coverage. In this paper, Tyco Electronics (TE) provides an introduction to MIMO technology and reports the results of tests it performed to characterize the relative performance of MIMO and single input/single output (SISO) transmission schemes.