Mobile radio networks have risen in prominence over the Last few years, primarily by the rise
in popularity of cellular phones. It is important to recognise however that mobile radio
technology fulfils a far wider range of applications that meet the demands of the modern
world. These include the networks that allow police and emergency services to serve the
public, military networks for operations and humanitarian support, and the mobile technol-
ogies that are vital to the safety of aircraft.
The Last decade proved to be hugely successful for the mobile communications industry,
characterised by continued and rapid growth in demand, spurred on by new technological
advances and innovative marketing techniques. Of course, when we refer to mobile commu-
nications, we tend to implicitly refer to cellular systems, such as GSM. The plight of the
mobile-satellite industry over the Last decade, although eventful, has, at times, been more akin
to an out of control roller coaster ride.
The insinuation of telecommunications into the daily fabric of our lives has been
arguably the most important and surprising development of the Last 25 years. Before
this revolution, telephone service and its place in our lives had been largely stable
for more than a generation. The growth was, so to speak, lateral, as the global reach
of telecommunications extended and more people got telephone service. The
distinction between oversea and domestic calls blurred with the advances in
switching and transmission, undersea cable, and communication satellites. Traffic
on the network remained overwhelmingly voice, largely in analog format with
facsimile (Fax) beginning to make inroads.
Notwithstanding its infancy, wireless mesh networking (WMN) is a hot and
growing field. Wireless mesh networks began in the military, but have since
become of great interest for commercial use in the Last decade, both in local
area networks and metropolitan area networks. The attractiveness of mesh
networks comes from their ability to interconnect either mobile or fixed
devices with radio interfaces, to share information dynamically, or simply to
extend range through multi-hopping.
The telecommunications industry has seen a rapid boost within the Last decade. New realities
and visions of functionalities in various telecommunications networks have brought forward the
concept of next-generation networks (NGNs). The competitions among operators for support-
ing various services, lowering of the cost of having mobile and cellular phones and smartphones,
increasing demand for general mobility, explosion of digital traffic, and advent of convergence
network technologies added more dynamism in the idea of NGNs. In fact, facilitating con-
vergence of networks and convergence of various types of services is a significant objective of
NGNs.
Transmit power in wireless cellular networks is a key degree of freedom
in the management of interference, energy, and connectivity. Power
control in both uplink and downlink of a cellular network has been
extensively studied, especially over the Last 15 years, and some of the
results have enabled the continuous evolution and significant impact of
the digital cellular technology.
Digital mobile wireless communication and the Internet have undergone a
fantastic growth in the Last few years and, despite originating from two different
worlds, they are converging. This convergence corresponds to the evolution of
mobile systems towards the highest broadband data transmissions (GSM,
EDGE/GPRS, UMTS then HSDPA), while the computing world gets equipped with
wireless technologies such as Wi-Fi or Wi-Max.
Short-range communications is one of the most relevant as well as diversified fields of en-
deavour in wireless communications. As such, it has been a subject of intense research and
development worldwide, particularly in the Last decade. There is no reason to believe that this
trend will decline. On the contrary, the rapidly crystallizing vision of a hyper-connected world
will certainly strengthen the role of short-range communications in the future. Concepts such
as wireless social networks, Internet of things, car communications, home and office network-
ing, wireless grids and personal communications heavily rely on short-range communications
technology.
This book addresses the issues on the development of next generation CDMA technologies and
contains a lot of information on the subject from both the open literature and my own research
activities in the Last fifteen years.
Changes in telecommunications are impacting all types of user
group, which include business users, traveling users, small and
home offices, and residential users. The acceptance rate of telecom-
munications and information services is accelerating significantly.
Voice services needed approximately 50 years to reach a very high
teledensity; television needed just 15 years to change the culture
and lives of many families; the Internet and its related services have
been penetrating and changing business practices and private com-
munications over the Last 2 to 3 years.
