PAGE CONTENTS
Objectives
Autonomous Driving (AD) technology provides safety critical services enabling communication between a vehicle and the environment that may control or affect it. It includes communication with involved systems and actors to enhance the level of connectivity and intelligence for a safer, more efficient, autonomous, predictable, and more enjoyable driving experience in an non-terrestrial network (NTN)/terrestrial network (TN) environment.
Due to 5GAA roadmap [RD02], the mass deployment of AD services may happen in three waves:
- Phase I, from 2027 on, Narrowband Data Rate Use Cases
- Phase II, from 2029 on, Wideband Data Rate Use Cases
- Phase III, from 2030 on, Broadband Data Rate Use Cases
From 2030, broadband services such as over the air software update service will become technically feasible. Such services would also require the deployment of LEO satellite constellations working in the S- and L-band with sufficient satellites to cover them or even require the deployment of LEO satellite constellations working in higher frequencies, like Ka- and Ku- band.
The objective of the activity is to demonstrate the provision of delay-tolerant broadband services specified for AD over satellite constellations in an integrated NTN/TN environment.
Targeted Improvements:
- Secure multicast IP connectivity (MBS) among AD server/clients through constellations.
- Specification of 5QI for AD and recommendation to 3GPP relevant working groups.
- Seamless integration of AD server/clients in NTN/TN environment.
Challenges
Provision of AD services requires generally multicast and broadcast services to spare valuable bandwidth, when compared with unicast services. The activity shall showcase the provision of MBS services through LEO satellite constellations, demanding an MBS capable satellite payload, to support the 3GPP MBS based application.
System Architecture
The System architecture comprises an integrated satellite-based NTN/TN 5GS with LEO satellite constellation utilizing Inter-Satellite Links (ISL) in fronthaul segment. The system architecture allows 3GPP Multicast Broadcast Services (MBS) conveying the Autonomous Driving services from a control centre down to target vehicle. The NG-RAN part of the system allows the point-to-point (PTP) and point to multipoint (PTM) packet delivery over a Satellite Radio Interface (SRI). The vehicle (UE) can subscribe for MBS sessions to receive the desired content, as unicast, multicast or broadcast delivery in the spot beam of the access satellite.
Plan
Starting from specifying the high-level system architecture and use case scenarios in Autonomous Driving, the activity generates a full set of self-contained technical requirements, as input to MS1 (SRR).
In MS2, upon a trade-off analysis, the activity selects down the most appropriate system architecture and delivers a detailed system design, to be approved in MS2 (SDR).
The activity then goes on to implement a simulator that allows the verification of the requirements, followed by implementing and executing of real field trials in MS3 (TRR).
The goal of the final milestone MS4 (FS) is the verification and validation of the requirements showing an end-to-end Autonomous Driving service provision over MBS capable LEO satellite constellation.
Current Status
Upon a successful kick-off meeting attending ESA and Frequentis members on Project Start in Q4 2025, the Frequentis team has started specifying the AD-SAT system scenarios and general requirements. The next review milestone is planned as System Requirement Review (SRR) in Q2 2026.
