Design & development of an HSPA system simulator for network planning

Abstract: HSPA planning requires identification of key performance indicators  (KPIs), such as infrastructure cost,performance, service quality and the amount of E/M pollution. To evaluate such a framework describing and linking these key elements for HSPA planning and optimization we need to carry out a set of HSPA system-level event-driven simulations under different scenarios. To have such simulations, a new tool should be developed. In this thesis work a simulation tool is developed within NS-3, an open source network simulator. The simulation tool consists several entities to represent a UMTS network and respective nodes in it, and necessary procedures to form a network dynamically. A simple base station removal algorithm in a system level, is developed focusing on the reduction of capital expenditure (CAPEX) of a network. The algorithm defines a cost function in order to remove the most costly base station from network preserving the target coverage percentage. Baseline results show that the simulation tool is working properly and later the results from algorithm indicate that, it is possible to use the  algorithm within a dynamic simulation.