TTI Bundling in FDD and TD-LTE

Abstract
TTI Bundling has been introduced in FDD and TD-LTE to improve Uplink coverage. In
this blog, we shall present the salient features of TTI Bundling with respect to FDD and
TD-LTE. We will first explore the motivation for TTI Bundling and then compare it with
other techniques. Finally, we shall address the implementation of TTI bundling in FDD
and TD-LTE.
Introduction
TTI bundling is a technique used to send a transport block multiple times in consecutive
subframes without waiting for HARQ ACK/NACK messages. Normally, a transport block
is converted to multiple redundancy versions after coding and the first redundancy
version is sent in a subframe. Subsequent transmissions of the transport block are
dependent on the HARQ ACK/NACK which is sent 4 subframe durations later or more
after the first transmission. In TTI bundling, the different redundancy versions can all be
sent in consecutive subframes without waiting for the HARQ ACK/NACK feedback and
a combined ACK/NACK can be sent after processing all the transmissions of a transport
block.
The motivation for TTI bundling which is illustrated in Figure 1 is the low transmission
power of some handsets, short TTI length, and the long RTT of the HARQ
transmissions. TTI bundling is expected to improve the UL coverage of applications like
VOIP over LTE wherein low power handsets are likely to be involved. This feature has
more relevance for TDD over FDD as coverage issues are likely to be more challenging
in TD-LTE. Simulation results reported in publications indicate a 4 dB gain due to TTI
bundling on the UL.

Alternative Approach
The alternative to TTI bundling is RLC segmentation wherein a VOIP payload is split
into smaller size RLC PDUs as shown in Figure 2. The smaller RLC PDUs will result in
smaller transport blocks which can be decoded with better accuracy. One drawback of
this method is the potential overhead increase due to RLC segmentation due to multiple
RLC headers needed. For a typical VOIP payload, it has been shown that as we
increase the segmentation factor from 1 to 8, the overhead increases from 14% to
55%. Each RLC PDU which is mapped into a transport block will need a separate
PDCCH assignment message which will contribute to control signal overhead for such a
scheme. There might be retransmissions of each of those transport blocks which will
also potentially increase the control signaling overhead. In addition, since we are
transmitting many small transport blocks, the chances of interpreting a NACK as an
ACK also increases proportionately with the increase in the RLC segmentation size.
Hence, RLC segmentation has many disadvantages when we consider the transmission
of a VOIP like payload from a power limited terminal.

Overview of TTI Bundling

TTI bundling is used to achieve successful transmissions from power limited terminals.
The process as shown in Figure 3 is typically triggered by UE informing the eNB about
its power limitations at the present state. This could for example happen at the edge of
a cell when the terminal has to send high power but is limited by the power capability of
the terminal. This triggers the eNB to transmit the various redundancy versions of the
same transport block in consecutive subframes or TTIs giving rise to the name TTI
bundling. A single PDCCH allocation is sufficient for the multiple transmissions thus
saving control overhead as compared to the RLC segmentation approach. A single
HARQ ACK/NACK for the combined transmissions is generated after processing the TTI
bundle which can reduce the error rate of the transport block as compared with
processing a single redundancy version. This approach can also reduce the delay in
the HARQ process compared to transmissions of the redundancy versions separated in
time using the normal approach.

TTI Bundling Operation

As shown in Figure 4, TTI bundling enables up to 4 redundancy versions of the same
transport block to be sent in 4 consecutive subframes. In TD-LTE systems, the TDD
configurations standardized allow only a maximum of 3 consecutive UL subframes. A
single RLC PDU is transmitted as multiple redundancy versions in consecutive
subframes using a single common allocation. The channel coding used in LTE enables
easy generation of the multiple redundancy versions from which the transmissions in
the TTI bundle are generated. A common RLC header is shared across the TTI bundle
and the same HARQ process identity is used for multiple transmissions in the TTI
bundle. Combined processing of the redundant transmissions over multiple subframes
leads to a better probability of detection of the transport block. Thus, with limited power,
the UE has a better chance of a successful transmission with lesser latency using the
TTI bundling method.

Summary: TTI bundling is a useful technique for improving coverage of VOIP handsets
in LTE systems. It is applicable to both FDD and TD-LTE deployments and can improve
the link budget by up to 4 dB. Differences in implementation exist between FDD and
TD-LTE systems. TTI bundling helps achieve good latency performance for VOIP even
at the edges of cells.