Project Partners

Ranplan Wireless Network Design Ltd.

Incorporated in 2006, Ranplan (Radio Access Network Planning) Ltd. (www.ranplan.co.uk) is an SME that is dedicated in developing automatic RAN planning and optimisation (P&O) tools, and in providing training and consulting services on wireless network P&O.

It is expected that Ranplan will launch its automatic RAN P&O tools suite for 3G, HSPA (High Speed Packet Access) and WiMAX in 2008. The development is mainly funded by private investors and the revenues generated in its successful Components department (www.ranplan.com). Ranplan is currently the industrial partner (providing 1/3 of the funding) of three EPSRC (www.epsrc.ac.uk) CASE (Corporative Award for Science and Engineering) PhD studentships. Ranplan is very much interested in exploiting the outcomes of the project and incorporating them into its advanced radio network P&O tools. The project results are expected to contribute to the company’s technology innovation. This is vital to the development of a high-tech SME like Ranplan.

Ranplan aims to become a world leader in RAN P&O by 2013. In the medium to long term (2013 ~2018), it is estimated that Ranplan’s RAN P&O tools in 3G/HSPA/WiMAX/LTE and related consulting and training services will generate revenues of some €10 million per annum.

INSA

One of the top French engineering universities, INSA Lyon (Institut National des Sciences Appliquées de Lyon), multidisciplinary and international, is at the heart of the European Higher Education Area. INSA Lyon applies a policy of excellence implemented at all levels. INSA Lyon was the first INSA to be created in 1957 and graduates over 800 engineers each year.

The CITI laboratory works on the design, modelling and validation of software and hardware elements for deploying services and protocols into networks and embedded communicating systems. The main relevant issues concern the interoperability of different systems and protocols, and the optimization of radio, network and system resources for services deployment and provision. CITI hosts the *ARES* project affiliated to INRIA Rhône-Alpes (http://www.inrialpes.fr). The ARES project tackles the deployment of services on dynamic wireless networks including radio resource optimization, protocols and interoperability. This project includes at the moment 2 professors, 6 associate professors and 1full researcher. 15 PhD students are currently working in ARES and CITI welcomes each year about 20 master’s students.

University of Bedfordshire

The Department - There are 22 academic staff (inclusive of 5 professors), over 10 postdoctoral Research Fellows (RFs) and some 30 PhD research students (RSs) at the Dept. of Computing and Information Systems (DCIS), UoB. Specific expertise relevant to this project within the department is as follows: RAN P&O, radio propagation modelling, HEC and OR. Within the last three years, DCIS members won over €6.0 million grants from the European Commission (EC), the EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Science Research Council), etc.

The department has an extremely good relationship with local business. In the last 5 years, the department obtained seven EPSRC CASE PhD studentships, four KTP (Knowledge Transfer Programme) and six KEEP (Knowledge Partners East of England) projects with local SMEs. The Group –The project will be hosted by the Centre for Wireless Network Design (CWiND). The Centre is one of the largest and leading research groups in RAN P&O. Within CWiND, there are 6 academics (two professors, 4 senior lecturers), 5 postdoctoral RFs, and 13 PhD students working on projects related to radio propagation modelling, UMTS/HSPA/LTE, Wi-Fi, and WiMAX P&O.

With over €2.5 million current funding, the Centre is also one of the best-funded research groups in wireless network P&O in academia. CWiND is currently hosting four EU FP6/FP7 projects on RAN P&O, two EPSRC projects on radio channel modelling, and one EPSRC project on WiMAX based femtocells [26]. It needs to point out that the EPSRC femtocell project is the first and also the only (during the proposal writing) project funded by the EPSRC on femtocell technologies. CWIND is very much interested in commercialising its research outcomes.

Pr Jie Zhang and his team have moved to the University of Sheffield

University of Sheffield

The EEE Department at Sheffield is respected internationally for its many important contributions in the field of Electronic and Electrical Engineering. The Department currently has 41 Academic/Academic Related staff, (including 17 professors) and 31 research staff. We also have a dedicated team of 23 technical and 17 administrative support staff. Our student community comprises approximately 500 undergraduate and postgraduate taught and research students. Continuing Research and Teaching Excellence.

EPSRC currently provide over £16.5m of sponsorship funding for our research activities and this makes us one of the best supported departments in the country (Dec 2010). This level of support feeds directly into our teaching providing students with access to world-class facilities and exposure to the very latest developments in the field. EPSRC also provide an additional £500k as a Doctoral Training Award to provide scholarships for PhD students. EPSRC (Engineering and Physical Science Research Council) are a government funded body and a major sponsor of university based research. EPSRC’s Grants on the Web page to see how we compare with our peers.

Our students are highly satisfied with their experience and correspondingly we have been ranked joint number 1 for employability in the National Student Survey with over 95% of our most recent students employed in graduate level jobs. For further information consult Unistats, an official government run website dedicated to providing an independent guide to university statistics including those obtained from the National Student Survey.

Combined with our 90% overall satisfaction rating from our students in the 2008 National Student Survey, the recent RAE 2008 results confirm our position as one of the leading EEE departments in the UK. The research of over 92% of our academic staff was submitted to the recent Research Assessment Exercise (RAE 2008), the results of which were published on 18 December 2008. 60% of the Department´s research activity was classed as either world-leading or internationally excellent, and nearly all (95%) was classed as being internationally recognised and higher. The increase in submitted staff numbers from 27 in RAE 2001 to 38 in RAE 2008 is evidence of our strong and dynamic research culture, sustained over many years and growing steadily.

The Department's teaching is underpinned by research at the leading edge. The world class laboratories are available to undergraduates and postgraduates. They include the UK's EPSRC National Centre for III-V Technologies, the development of high performance motors and drive electronics, next-generation communication and radar systems, the design and systems incorporation of novel integrated circuits.