Software-only TDOA/RTT positioning for 3G WCDMA wireless network

A hybrid location finding technique based on time difference of arrival (TDOA) with round-trip time (RTT) measurements is proposed for a wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA) network. In this technique, a mobile station measures timing from at least three base stations using user equipment receive–transmit (UE Rx– Tx) time difference and at least three base stations measure timing from the mobile station using RTT. The timing measurements of mobile and base stations are then combined to solve for both the location of the mobile and the synchronization offset between base stations. A software-only geolocation system based on the above mobile/base stations timing measurements is implemented in Matlab platform and the performance of the system is investigated using large-scale propagation models. Copyright # 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.