Xilinx, EB Drive OBSAI Standard Adoption for Wireless Infrastructure
November 3, 2008 // Published as a news service by IHS
Xilinx Inc. and Elektrobit (EB) announced that the Xilinx LogiCORE intellectual property (IP) tool completed interoperability testing for the open base station architecture initiative (OBSAI) Reference Point 3-01 (RP3-01) specification.
Tests were conducted jointly by Xilinx and EB using the Xilinx Virtex-5 LXT field-programmable gate array (FPGA) platform for embedded, low-power serial connectivity applications and the EB base station interface tester, an OBSAI interface analyzer.
This joint interoperability is a step forward for the adoption of wireless interconnectivity standards inside modern base station architectures and brings the benefits of shorter development times and reduced system costs to wireless base station developers, Xilinx and EB said.
The OBSAI aims to create a suite of open specifications for base station architectures. The RP3-01 specification describes data and control requirements between the base station baseband and remote radio heads.
"OBSAI warmly welcomes the collaboration of Xilinx and EB. Interoperability tests such as these help to drive the adoption of the OBSAI standard in the broader market," said Tero Mustala, head of the OBSAI management board.
"The challenges with interoperability are clear, and they require ongoing efforts by the whole community. As a next step, the OBSAI initiative has started the activity to define air interface profiles to enable even better interoperability between applications developed by different companies," Mustala said.
"Verification of OBSAI implementations is vital for the successful progress of the open market ideology," said Johanna Hugg, EB product manager.
"The EB base station interface tester was developed exactly for this purpose, enabling independent verification of base station modules or IP designs. The performed interoperability tests with Xilinx demonstrate the value of the EB solution for the whole market," Hugg said.
Source: Xilinx Inc.