For readers of Reamde, Neal Stephenson’s most recent novel set in the world of massively multiplayer online games and computer viruses, the Chinese city of Xiamen plays a pivotal role as his characters try and locate the Troll (I mention this as I am currently working my way through its 1,200 pages whilst trying to support its 1.4kg weight...) For those more interested in real life, Xiamen is the location of the world’s first live video broadcast video stream over TD-LTE.

Nokia Siemens Networks says that the time division variant of LTE has successfully been used for a live TV broadcast for the first time. On January 5, China Mobile’s TD-LTE network transmitted a live video stream of the Xiamen International Marathon to the TV centres of China Central TV and Xiamen TV for live broadcasting.

NSN adds that the TD-LTE network, for which it was the sole vendor, exceeded required parameters to transmit HD video and images from cameras on the move, matching the quality of a relay via satellite. It believes this proves that LTE has a viable role for future outside broadcasting services.

Markus Borchert, president of NSN Greater China Region, said that: “this world-first is yet another proof point for us as a leader in driving the TD-LTE innovation, globalisation and commercialisation”.

NSN deployed its single RAN advanced platform, based on its Flexi Multiradio 10 Base Station, to China Mobile’s TD-LTE pre-commercial trial network in Xiamen. The vendor reported that the TD-LTE network supported the entire event with a zero bit error rate. In spite of the increased demand for network capacity with exceptional traffic and load conditions, there was no degradation in network performance, no packet loss and no delay during the two and a half hour live transmission of the event. A stable uplink throughput of 5Mbit/s ensured optimal video quality for TV viewing.