Optimizing vertical sectorization for high-rises

Abstract

Vertical sectorization is a recent development of active antenna technologies, whereas cellular providers make use of sectors in the vertical domain in addition to the standard horizontal sectorization currently in place. In this paper, we develop a framework to analyze and optimize vertical sectorization for high-rise buildings in urban environments. We start with a generic urban network topology with high-rise buildings and use it to derive the distribution of the elevation angles of the user equipments (UEs) in a cell. Using this distribution, we derive the values of tilts that maximize the coverage of all the UEs for the cases of one and two vertical sectors. This work provides answers to how a cellular service provider should perform vertical sectorization for different base station heights, cell sizes and various urban environments.