Hybrid Positioning Solution Using 5G and GNSS

Abstract: The importance of accurate position estimation is becoming more necessary as industries and society increasingly rely on autonomous or wireless devices while the capabilities of existing positioning solutions fail to meet the demanding requirements. This situation has provided opportunities for wireless positioning techniques with the rollout of 5G which has led to many enhancements to the network protocol related to positioning. This report investigates the feasibility of meeting these requirements with the use of existing GNSS positioning solutions and yet-to-be implemented 5G positioning methods. We evaluate the performance using different measurements separately as well as a hybridization between them to examine the optimal result. The report also demonstrates the potential of using only a single BS to achieve accurate positioning, which is not possible with e.g. LTE.  The method in this report is based on partly well-proven theory for positioning together with recent developed concepts for radio network localization. By using an advanced simulator that generates realistic signals and measurements in virtual deployments of base-stations and users, our method can be well evaluated, which makes the results interesting for both academia and industry. The results show good potential for both 5G stand-alone positioning as well as hybrid 5G and GNSS positioning. This report demonstrates that a single BS can locate a UE in line-of-sight of 200 meters within 1.5 meters for 80% of the cases without using any GNSS system.