In smartphones, “AI” is often used to improve the look and quality of your photos. Qualcomm said it’s going even further by using AI to improve cellular performance and your smartphone’s 5G coverage.
Specifically, Qualcomm claims to be building AI capabilities into its modems to improve their signal coverage, further improving the range of all radios connected to a device, including 4G and 5G. Artificial intelligence technology will be included in the Snapdragon X70 modem, which is due out this year and will appear in smartphones in 2023.
Qualcomm took the occasion of its 5G summit to make announcements, many of which are intended to boost the performance of short-range, high-speed millimeter-wave (mmWave) technology. 5G wireless technology consists of two technologies working in parallel: sub-6 GHz wireless signals that can cover tens of miles at a few hundred megabits per second, and powerful but limited millimeter wave that only covers hundreds of feet at more than gigabit per second bandwidth. T-Mobile also uses the middle lane, sharing the difference.
Most worrying, though, are the big numbers from mmWave, whose real-life scenarios include thousands of people taking photos and videos of an outdoor concert and sharing them on social media. However, its limited range means that Qualcomm and carriers are trying to improve mmWave performance. AI is one of the answers.
Qualcomm
Qualcomm’s senior director of product marketing, Ignacio Contreras, told reporters that AI-based inference could expand mmWave’s range by about 20 percent, though the technique could be used to improve other cellular technologies as well.
Essentially, Qualcomm teaches the modem what to do before it encounters a real-world scenario. Cell phones are always “talking” to the cell tower, reporting conditions and allowing the tower to optimize data transmission. The AI modem can then be “trained” before entering the field. In the real world, the smartphone’s modem will report current conditions as well as what network conditions it expects, improving performance for all devices in the system. With mmWave, the phone can know to switch to a new beam if one is available.
“With AI processing integrated into our system model, the device can not only report current conditions, but also predict what conditions will be in a moment,” Contreras added.
At its summit, Qualcomm will also demonstrate a standalone mmWave. Today, every mmWave deployment requires a sub-6 GHz spectrum “anchor” to provide control functionality. Freeing mmWave from this control should allow 5G to be used in more applications, such as the fixed wireless broadband that T-Mobile provides.
Finally, Qualcomm said it will debut Smart Transmit 3.0 technology, which intelligently manages power when a smartphone uploads data to the network. Smart Transmit 3.0 power management algorithms will now include information sent over Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.