FlexPreDem: Demostrator of Precoding Techniques for Flexible Broadband Systems

Title: FlexPreDem: Demostrator of Precoding Techniques for Flexible Broadband Systems
Funding source: European Space Agency (ESA)
Partners: SES S.A., Betzdorf, Luxembourg
Principal investigator: Dr. Symeon Chatzinotas
Duration: 06/2018 - 06/2020

The capability to flexibly allocate on-board resources over the service coverage is becoming a must for future broadband multibeam satellites. Previous and current systems have shown that in large multibeam satellites the demand in some spot beams greatly exceeds the available capacity (hot-spots) while in others the situation is the opposite (cold-spots). This raises a paradoxical scenario where demand is left unmet in the hot-spots while capacity is left unused in the cold-spots. The consequence for the satellite operator and service provider is twofold: (i) a loss of the revenue corresponding to the unmet demand plus, (ii) the loss of the investment in the unused capacity. The primary goal of flexibility is then to solve this paradox and maximize the amount of system capacity that is actually used (i.e. sold) by allocating it where needed.

Beam Hopping has been proposed as a promising technological enabler to provide a very high level of flexibility to manage irregular and time variant traffic requests in the satellite coverage area. However, in certain scenarios (like the high throughput full frequency reuses scenario) the performance of Beam Hopping is heavily degraded by the self-interference generated by the system, particularly when neighboring co-channel beams are activated at the same time. Such co-channel interference can be mitigated in the satellite forward link by adopting precoding techniques.

FlexPreDem objective is to demonstrate the benefits and address the challenges at various levels of the combination of Beam Hopping and Precoding techniques over broadband High Throughput Satellite systems.

To fully define the required multi-beam scenario, the traffic demand distribution should be properly modelled. Below, we propose an aeronautical-based traffic model to provide coverage along critical aviation routes.

Project Partners:

• SIGCOM, SnT, University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg
• SES S.A., Betzdorf, Luxembourg

Management Team:

• PI: Dr. Symeon Chatzinotas (SnT)

Research Team:

• Dr Symeon Chatzinotas (SnT) – Project Manager
• Dr Eva Lagunas (SnT) – Technical Contact Point
• Dr Nicola Maturo (SnT)
• Dr Hayder Al-hraishawi (SnT)
• Dr Mirza Kibria (SnT)

Industrial Collaborators:

• Dr. Joel Grotz (SES)

Relevant Links:

• PreDem
• OPTIMUS
• PROSAT
• MEO-MODEM

Contact:

• Dr. Eva Lagunas
• Dr. Symeon Chatzinotas