Texas Instruments Inc. (TI) announced two new software packages for its KeyStone-based multicore system-on-chips (SoCs). The first software offering is a new production ready small cell Physical (PHY) software package, enabling developers to quickly, easily and cost effectively design highly differentiated small cell base stations. The second software offering is a transport software package for wireless and other network-oriented applications.
With software playing a key role in achieving optimal performance in the design process, these integrated software offerings provide unique features and benefits for base station developers, allowing them to accelerate their designs on TI's multicore platform today. The software is scalable from small cell through macro base stations with the "production ready" offering focused on small cells. In addition, the software supports robust synchronization options and network listening capabilities for LTE and WCDMA.
"We have found a true roadmap partner in TI, and their latest software packages validate our decision to select TI," said Dan Picker, CTO, PureWave Networks. "Our mantra is to develop higher performing, highly differentiated small cell base stations and get them to market in record time. TI's KeyStone SoCs and software have given us a solid foundation on which to build our products and have streamlined their development, enabling us to focus on meeting the market's more challenging requirements with features that make our products stand out."
"We selected TI for our multi-mode metrocells because of their leading performance credentials and the maturity of their overall solution," said Pete Keevill, VP Engineering and Co-founder Ubiquisys. "TI's Base Station SoftwarePac offers us a complete and flexible PHY layer for our multi-mode LTE/WCDMA small cell base stations. This solid foundation enables us to focus on the system-level features now demanded by operators, such the real-time self-organization and sophisticated multi-cell congestion management required for macro-class performance."
Building on its long-standing history of success in the base station market, TI designed these new software packages to ease the OEM development of high performance small cell base stations. By offering a complete PHY layer for single-and dual-mode LTE and WCDMA, TI has eliminated one of the most complex tasks of base station design. This enables manufacturers to save time, resources and budget normally used in PHY development, and to allocate those resources to focus on differentiating their product. The interface to TI's PHY software is compliant with the Femto Application Platform Interface (FAPI), as defined by the Small Cell Forum, facilitating seamless integration with a complete LTE or WCDMA stack. TI's PHY design is modular and open so customers can differentiate within the PHY design by incorporating proprietary algorithms critical for their product differentiation. This makes it possible for the base station manufacturers to customize their products according to different network operators' needs.
Being production ready means TI undertook exhaustive testing of the software with a variety of commercial UEs, further reducing OEM developmental risk. While this software package is designed for small cells, it is scalable and can be retargeted for macro base station designs.
TI's transport software package is ideal for wireless and network-oriented applications, including base stations and edge network routing and switching. Developers of network-oriented applications can integrate their own transport stack to TI's transport library, completing the development process. Integrated in TI's multicore software development kit (MCSDK), the transport software package leverages flow-through fast-path acceleration in KeyStone for the data plane and control plane processing.
The PHY software package is also built on the MCSDK. TI's MCSDK provides developers with a well-integrated software development platform encompassing efficient multicore communication layers for intercore and interchip communication, validated and optimized drivers integrated with SYS/BIOS, TI's real time operating system (RTOS), and Linux support with relevant demonstration examples.
Availability
TI's Base Station SoftwarePac for small cells will be available in the first half of 2013, while the transport software package is available now with the latest version of the MCSDK. For more information please visitwww.ti.com/multicore.