Software Defined Radio (SDR) is an umbrella term that covers a plethora of technologies and solutions, ranging from reconfigurable base stations to systems that can adapt to new technologies or new frequencies on the fly - without the system suffering any downtime or users experiencing service interruptions.
Although SDR promises several benefits to mobile operators, a cost effective implementation is not without challenges.
Indeed, true forms of SDR are only economically viable for military or government applications, but telecoms applications are starting to take advantage of the new concept to give mobile operators a guaranteed evolution path to future technologies.