Method of operating telecommunications network

Abstract

A method (200) of operating a radio access point (115), the radio access point providing a radio access network for a telecommunications network (100), the radio access point comprising a plurality of antenna elements (122), the method comprising the steps of: determining (230) performance requirements for a network slice to which a user equipment (110), UE, of the telecommunications network is allocated; selecting a spatial arrangement of a subset of the plurality of antenna elements (230) according to the determined performance requirements; retaining the selected subset for use only by the network slice (250); and communicating network communications between the radio access point and the UE using only the subset of antenna elements (540).

Description

Technical Field

[0001] The present invention relates to a method of operating a wireless telecommunications network, and in particular to a radio access point of a radio access network. Background Art

[0002] In cellular telecommunications, network slicing is a method of virtualizing a network in order to create multiple logical networks within a single physical network. This is often used to provide differentiated service models that may include different performance and / or stability characteristics, and this is supported by the fact that network slices are isolated from each other during operation. Therefore, high traffic or a large number of users on one slice cannot adversely affect other network slices.

[0003] For example, a network slice may be configured to provide specialized functionality, including: dedicated services for emergency services (which require at least high reliability); enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB); and massive machine type communications (MMTC).

[0004] In order to facilitate effective network slicing in cellular telecommunications, it is desirable to provide end-to-end network slicing, where network slices can be provided from the Radio Access Network (RAN), through the transport network, all the way to the core network.

[0005] However, existing solutions to implement network slicing as part of the RAN may require dedicated radio spectrum, dedicated base stations and / or dedicated RAN schedulers; such solutions may require significant financial costs and operational complexity.

[0006] It is an object of the present invention to alleviate at least some of the above problems. Summary of the invention

[0007] According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided: a method for operating a radio access point, the radio access point providing a radio access network for a telecommunications network, the radio access point comprising a plurality of antenna elements, the method comprising the following steps: determining performance requirements for a network slice to which a user equipment UE of the telecommunications network is assigned; selecting a spatial arrangement of a subset of the plurality of antenna elements based on the determined performance requirements; reserving the selected subset for use only by the network slice; and transmitting network communications between the radio access point and the UE using only the subset of antenna elements.

[0008] Preferably, the subset of antenna elements comprises at least two antenna elements and may not comprise all antenna elements of the radio access point. As used herein, the term "spatial arrangement" applied to the subset of antenna elements preferably means a relative and / or absolute spatial distribution of the antenna elements, which is characterized by at least the spacing between the antenna elements. The "spatial arrangement" may comprise a geometric pattern.

[0009] Preferably, transmitting network communications further comprises the steps of: receiving a wireless signal from the UE at the radio access point; identifying a network slice to which the UE is assigned, thereby determining a subset of antenna elements; and performing aperture synthesis of the wireless signal using each antenna element in the subset.

[0010] Preferably, performing aperture synthesis comprises performing a (optionally non-linear) deconvolution and / or Fourier transform on the wireless signals received by each antenna element in the subset. Preferably, performing aperture synthesis further comprises joint interference cancellation processing. Preferably, the aperture synthesis is performed without processing any wireless signals received by antenna elements that are not members of the subset of antenna elements. Preferably, aperture synthesis is performed by a radio resource unit of the radio access point.

[0011] Preferably, performing aperture synthesis comprises measuring the amplitude and phase of the wireless signal by means of each antenna element in the subset.

[0012] Preferably, transmitting the network communication further comprises transmitting the wireless signal from the radio access point to the UE using only each antenna element in the subset.

[0013] Preferably, the separation distance between at least two antenna elements in a subset is selected according to performance requirements. Preferably, the separation distance between each antenna element is selected according to performance requirements. Preferably, the separation distance and / or the area defined by the subset increases as the performance requirements increase.

[0014] Preferably, the area enclosed by the subset of antenna elements in the subset is selected according to performance requirements.Preferably, the area increases as performance requirements increase, and may be increased by using a minimum number of antenna elements.

[0015] Preferably, the separation distance and / or the area bounded by the subsets decreases as performance requirements decrease.

[0016] Preferably, selecting the spatial arrangement further comprises selecting the subset to have at least one axis of symmetry. Optionally, the arrangement is symmetric about at least one axis.

[0017] Preferably, selecting the spatial arrangement further comprises selecting a ratio of a subset of antenna elements arranged in a linear alignment. Preferably, when the UE is associated with a vertically mobile entity (e.g., a land or sea mobile entity), the ratio of antenna elements aligned horizontally increases and may be maximized, thereby facilitating improved spatial resolution when the entity moves horizontally. Preferably, when the UE is associated with a vertically mobile entity (e.g., an airborne, aerospace and / or mobile entity), the ratio of antenna elements aligned vertically increases and may be maximized, thereby facilitating improved spatial resolution when the entity moves vertically.

[0018] Preferably, the method further comprises the step of selecting a number of antenna elements for populating said subset, wherein said number is selected based on performance requirements.

[0019] Preferably, the method further comprises the step of selecting a number of antenna elements for populating the subset, wherein the number is selected independently of performance requirements. Optionally, the number is fixed for each network slice. Optionally, the number is selected based on the number of network slices provided at the radio access point.

[0020] According to another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a computer-readable carrier medium containing a computer program, which, when executed by a computer, causes the computer to execute the method as described above.

[0021] According to yet another aspect of the present invention, a radio access point is provided, comprising: a plurality of antenna elements; a processor configured to: determine performance requirements for a network slice to which a user equipment UE of the telecommunication network is assigned; and select a spatial arrangement of a subset of the plurality of antenna elements based on the determined performance requirements; a controller configured to reserve the selected subset for use only by the network slice; and a transmitter configured to transmit network communications between the radio access point and the UE using only a subset of the antenna elements.

[0022] Optionally, the method further comprises the step of identifying the UE as being assigned to a network slice, which may be performed by processing the received wireless signal to obtain a unique identifier of the UE, wherein the unique identifier may be a unique subscriber identifier.

[0023] Preferably, identifying the UE as being assigned to a network slice is performed by retrieving a mapping (optionally stored at the radio access point) associating the identified UE with the network slice.

[0024] Preferably, the method further comprises the step of identifying available antenna elements from information provided by the radio resource unit, and wherein retaining the subset of antenna elements is performed in dependence on identifying the available antenna elements.

[0025] Preferably, the method further comprises the step of storing information associating the unique identification of each antenna element in the subset of antenna elements with the unique identification of the network slice.

[0026] Optionally, the telecommunications network is in the form of: a wide area cellular telecommunications network; a wireless local area telecommunications network; a satellite communications network; and / or a HetNet.

[0027] Preferably, the plurality of antenna elements form part of a MIMO antenna array. Preferably, the plurality of antenna elements are configured as cooperative antenna elements. Preferably, the radio access point is in the form of a gNodeB or an eNodeB.

[0028] Preferably, the network slice is also provided at the core of the telecommunications network. Preferably, the network slice is an end-to-end network slice.

[0029] Preferably, the method further comprises the steps of receiving a command to establish a network slice at a radio access point, and performing a step of reserving a subset of antenna elements in response to the command.

[0030] Preferably, the steps of determining, selecting, retaining and / or transmitting are performed only by a part of the telecommunications network that is completely upstream of the UE. As used herein, the term "upstream" preferably means away from the UE and towards the network core. In this way, these steps can be performed only by the radio access point and the network core, without any interaction with the UE, so that the method is therefore invisible to the UE.

[0031] Preferably, the transmitting is performed by a radio resource unit of a radio access point.

[0032] In an alternative, the UE comprises multiple antenna elements, and the roles of the UE and the radio access point can be interchanged so that steps performed by the radio access point are performed by the UE instead, and vice versa. That is, the method can be performed by any transmitting and receiving entity, wherein the transmitting entity comprises multiple antenna elements.

[0033] The present invention includes any novel aspects described and / or shown herein. The present invention also extends to methods and / or apparatus substantially as described herein and / or as shown with reference to the accompanying drawings. The present invention is also provided as a computer program and / or computer program product for performing any method described herein and / or for embodying any apparatus features described herein, and a computer-readable medium having stored thereon a program for performing any method described herein and / or for embodying any apparatus features described herein. Features described as being implemented in hardware may alternatively be implemented in software, and vice versa.

[0034] Any means feature may also be provided as a corresponding step of a method, and vice versa.As used herein, means-plus-function features may alternatively be expressed in terms of their corresponding structure, for example as a suitably programmed processor.

[0035] Any feature in one aspect of the present invention may be applied to other aspects of the present invention in any appropriate combination. Any, some and / or all features in one aspect may be applied to any, some and / or all features in any other aspect in any appropriate combination. Specific combinations of various features described and defined in any aspect of the present invention may be independently implemented and / or provided and / or used.

[0036] As used throughout, unless otherwise indicated, the word "or" may be interpreted in an exclusive and / or inclusive sense.

[0037] The invention extends to a method for controlling a radio access point, and a radio access point as herein described and / or substantially as shown with reference to the accompanying drawings.

[0038] The present invention will now be described, purely by way of example, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:

[0039] Figure 1 is a schematic diagram of an exemplary telecommunications network;

[0040] Figure 2 is the process used to operate a telecommunications network in order to establish network slices;

[0041] Figure 3a to Figure 3d Various spatial arrangements of antenna elements used by established network slices are shown;

[0042] Figure 4 illustrates a process of uplink communication using an established network slice; and

[0043] Figure 5 The process of downlink communication using the established network slice is shown.

[0044] Specific description

[0045] Figure 1 1 is a schematic diagram of an exemplary telecommunications network 100 in the form of a wide area cellular telecommunications network, the exemplary telecommunications network 100 including a user equipment (UE) 110 configured to utilize the telecommunications network 100 by accessing a radio access network (RAN) provided by a radio access point 115 (e.g., a macro, micro, pico or femto cell site). The radio access point, in turn, is connected to a core 125 portion of the network 100.

[0046] In this example, the network 100 operates according to, for example, 5G technology. Thus, the core network 125 includes the following functional components (their functions are well defined in the art):

[0047] Access and mobility management function (AMF) 130;

[0048] Network Slice Selection Function (NSSF) 135;

[0049] Authentication Server Function (AUSF) 140;

[0050] Unified Data Management (UDM) 145;

[0051] Session Management Function (SMF) 150;

[0052] Policy Control Function (PCF) 155;

[0053] User plane function (UPF) 160;

[0054] Data Network (DN) 165; and

[0055] • Network orchestrator 170.

[0056] The network 100 provides and manages a plurality of network slices, each of which provides different services, at least through the above-described functional components of the core network 125. In particular, the NSSF 135 is configured to identify and select a suitable network slice for the UE 110 (e.g., based on the UE's service subscription), and then use the identified network slice and resources allocated to the network slice to process network communications associated with the UE.

[0057] The radio access point 115 includes: a multi-antenna array 120; a remote radio unit (RRU) 124; an antenna arrangement selection function (AASF) 126; and a baseband unit (BBU) 128. The AASF 126 communicates with the RRU and the BBU, and the RRU and the BBU also communicate with each other. The network orchestrator 170 communicates with the radio access point 115, specifically, at least with the AASF 126.

[0058] The multi-antenna array 120 includes a plurality of antenna elements 122 arranged in an array, wherein each antenna element includes a radio frequency chain (e.g., transceiver, encoder, decoder, amplifier, filter, etc.) for receiving and processing network communications (outgoing and incoming wireless signals). Figure 1 In the example shown, the multi-antenna array 120 is comprised of a 4×10 array of antenna elements 122 .

[0059] As is known in the art, the multi-antenna array 120 is operated to exploit spatial differences in the reception of multipath wireless signals, thereby helping to improve wireless signal processing. In particular, the multi-antenna array utilizes a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) approach, in particular a multi-user MIMO approach. Thus, the RRU 124 is configured to selectively and differentially use the individual antenna elements 122 for transmission, and demodulate the signal streams received by the different antenna elements 122 into separate channels. For example, such demodulation is performed using a linear decorrelator and / or a joint interference cancellation process, as is known with respect to MIMO. In one example, the multi-antenna array 120 is in the form of a minimum mean square error (MMSE) receiver.

[0060] To help provide differentiated network slicing at the radio access point 115, the telecommunications network 100 is configured to reserve different spatial arrangements of antenna elements 122 for use exclusively with given network slices, and to separate traffic from or to the antenna elements 122 based on assignment of a UE to a particular network slice.

[0061] Due to differences in propagation paths, antenna elements at different points in the multi-antenna array 120 may transmit or detect different signals (e.g., with respect to timing, phase, and amplitude). These differences may be combined by the receiver to improve reception of wireless signals, thereby facilitating the provision of differentiated services for different network slices. In particular, the process of aperture synthesis may be utilized for this purpose.

[0062] Aperture synthesis (or "synthetic imaging") is an interferometric processing technique that combines the signals detected by various spatially separated detectors. In doing so, the angular resolution of the combined signal from the detectors is greater than that of any single detector, and an angular resolution equal to the aperture, which is the size of the envelope surrounding the multiple detectors, can be achieved. For example, using aperture synthesis, four antenna elements (of relatively negligible size) arranged around a perimeter of 2 square meters can produce an angular resolution equivalent to a single aperture of 2 square meters. The efficacy of aperture synthesis depends on the spacing of the detectors; that is, as the spacing (or baseline) increases, the combined resolving power of the detectors increases.

[0063] Therefore, all other things being equal, a spatial arrangement of antenna elements with maximum spacing (e.g., at the ends of the multi-antenna array 120) will allow for greater angular resolution than a spatial arrangement of clustered antenna elements. With greater angular resolution, the performance of the radio access network can be improved, and this improvement can be reserved for specific network slices.

[0064] Figure 2 A process 200 for establishing a network slice at a radio access point 115 may exploit different characteristics of various spatial arrangements of antenna elements.

[0065] In a first step 210, the NSSF 135 generates an instruction to establish a RAN network slice (including reconfiguring an existing RAN network slice). The instruction includes: identification information identifying the radio access point 115 at which the RAN network slice is to be established; a unique identifier of the network slice to be established (or reconfigured) at the radio access point 115; performance requirement information specifying the quality of service required for the network slice; and population information identifying the UEs (such as UE 110) assigned to the network slice. The instruction is recorded in a database 180 associated with the AASF 126.

[0066] The instructions are then transmitted 220 to the network orchestrator 170 , which in turn transmits the instructions to the radio access point 115 specified in the identification information; the AASF 126 then receives the instructions.

[0067] The AASF 126 also receives resource availability information about available radio resources of the multi-antenna array 120 from the RRU 124. The resource availability information includes at least information about which antenna elements 122 are available (ie, not currently reserved for exclusive use by any network slice).

[0068] In a next step 230, recognizing that different spatial arrangements of antenna elements produce different radio performance characteristics, the AASF determines the most suitable arrangement of antenna elements for performance requirement information specifying required performance criteria of the radio access network, such as required levels of signal-to-noise ratio, packet error rate and / or signal angular resolution.

[0069] To determine the arrangement of antenna elements, the AASF utilizes rules for matching the arrangement of antenna elements with performance requirement information. In particular, the rules stipulate that the total outer envelope of the antenna elements is maximized for the maximum required performance and minimized for the minimum required performance.

[0070] In one example, the performance requirement information is selected based on at least the type of network slice, and the placement of antenna elements is selected accordingly. For example, a higher performance network slice (e.g., an ultra-reliable, low latency connection URLLC network slice) is assigned higher performance requirements than a lower performance network slice (e.g., an eMBB network slice), and thus the placement of antenna elements has a larger total range.

[0071] Turning to Figure 3, various spatial arrangements of (four) antenna elements on a multi-antenna array 120 consisting of an 8×6 array of antenna elements 122 are shown, each of which can provide a different level of performance and, therefore, differentiated services used by the network slice.

[0072] In Figure 3, the antenna elements shown in black shading 122-1 form an arrangement of antenna elements to be used by a given network slice, while antenna elements that do not form part thereof are not shaded.

[0073] exist Figure 3a , arrangement 300a consists of antenna elements at the four ends of the multi-antenna array 120, thereby maximizing the overall size of the envelope of the arrangement (i.e., the overall size to the entire extent of the multi-antenna array 120) and thus allowing an effective aperture of 8×6 by means of aperture synthesis.

[0074] In contrast, Figure 3b In , arrangement 300b consists of groups of four adjacent antenna elements, thereby minimizing the envelope of the arrangement (in two dimensions, and for an arrangement using four antenna elements), which provides an effective aperture of 2×2 for the purposes of aperture synthesis.

[0075] exist Figure 3c , arrangement 300c consists only of vertically aligned antenna elements, thereby providing a vertical angular resolution greater than the horizontal angular resolution and an effective relative aperture of 1 x 6. Such an arrangement may be particularly advantageous in situations where there are large performance requirements only in the vertical plane, such as in situations where the UE is associated with an entity that can move primarily vertically relative to the radio access point, such as an aircraft.

[0076] exist Figure 3d , arrangement 300d consists of only horizontally aligned antenna elements, thereby providing a larger horizontal angular resolution than a vertical angular resolution and an effective relative aperture of 8 x 1. Such an arrangement may be particularly advantageous where there are large performance requirements only in the horizontal plane, such as where the UE is associated with an entity that can move primarily horizontally relative to the radio access point, such as a land-based vehicle.

[0077] It will be appreciated that various other spatial arrangements are possible (and with more or fewer antenna elements) to pair with the desired performance level.

[0078] Thus, referring to the example of FIG. 3 , at step 230 of process 200 , the AASF is configured to select the following arrangements: an arrangement 300a requiring maximum performance; an arrangement 300b requiring minimum performance (in which four antenna elements are to be used); an arrangement 300c requiring maximum performance only in the vertical plane but minimum performance in the horizontal plane; and an arrangement 300d requiring maximum performance only in the horizontal plane but minimum performance in the vertical plane.

[0079] Return to Figure 2, in a next step 240, using the resource availability information, the AASF determines whether the multi-antenna array has available antenna elements distributed according to the arrangement determined in the previous step 230. If the multi-antenna array 120 has such an available antenna element arrangement, the process 200 proceeds to step 250, at which time the AASF 126 selects a subset of the (available) antenna elements distributed according to the identified arrangement, and then associates the selected subset of antenna elements with the network slice, thereby generating mapping information that associates specific antenna elements with specific network slices; the mapping information is recorded in the database 180. Based on the mapping information, the AASF 126 instructs the RRU 124 to implement logical isolation of the multi-antenna array 120 so as to reserve the selected subset of antenna elements for exclusive use by network communications associated with the network slice to which it is mapped. In this way, the subset of antenna elements is logically isolated from the rest of the multi-antenna array 120. In this way, the efficacy of aperture synthesis is adapted to the performance requirements of the network slice.

[0080] However, if the radio access point 115 does not have antenna elements distributed according to the identified arrangement (as determined at step 230), the process 200 returns to step 210 and the NSSF 135 instead attempts to establish a network slice at the RAN by instructing to reserve antenna elements 122 with scaled-down performance requirements and / or releasing antenna elements from other network slices.

[0081] Figure 4 and Figure 5 Each shows a process for uplink and downlink communications between a UE 110 and a radio access point 115, respectively, wherein the radio access point is configured to provide a RAN network slice using an antenna element arrangement as selected using process 200 (which therefore precedes both processes 400 and 500).

[0082] refer to Figure 4 , the uplink process 400 comprises a first step 410 in which the UE 110 generates network communications that are sent to the radio access point 115 and then transmits the network communications as wireless signals.

[0083] In the next step 420, the wireless signal is indiscriminately received at the plurality of antenna elements 122, including antenna elements of the network slices allocated and not allocated to the UE. Subsequently, each antenna element 122 receiving the wireless signal processes the received wireless signal and forwards the wireless signal to the RRU 124 individually.

[0084] In a next step 430, the RRU 124 performs initial processing on each wireless signal received from the antenna element; the initial processing is performed to identify the designated network slice associated with each wireless signal and, therefore, the UE. In one example, the identification of the designated network slice is performed by analyzing the wireless signal to identify the UE 110, for example, based on a unique subscriber identifier value, and mapping the identity of the UE 110 to its designated network slice based on demographic information (as described with reference to process 200).

[0085] After identifying the designated network slice, in a next step 440, the RRU then retrieves mapping information from the AASF 126 (as described with reference to process 200) in order to identify the subset of antenna elements reserved for the network slice 110 to which the UE is designated.

[0086] In a final step 450, the RRU performs aperture synthesis processing on the wireless signals received by only the antenna elements in the identified subset and ignores the wireless signals from the remaining antenna elements.

[0087] To perform aperture synthesis, the amplitude and phase of the wireless signal are measured and interferometric processing techniques are performed on these measurements to output a combined single signal from a subset of antenna elements that is converted into network communications for onward transmission to the BBU 128 .

[0088] The BBU may then be used to transmit network communications from the RRU to the network core 125 for subsequent processing via a designated network slice.

[0089] refer to Figure 5 , the downlink process 500 includes a first step 510 in which the telecommunications network generates a network communication destined for the UE 110. The network communication traverses the network core 125 and is transmitted to the radio access point 115 via the BBU 128. The BBU 128 then forwards the network communication to the AASF 126.

[0090] At the next step 520, upon receiving the network communication, the AASF 126 processes the network communication to identify the UE 110 to which the network communication is directed. The AASF 126 also retrieves from the population information and mapping information (as described with reference to process 200) an association between the identified UE 110 and: the network slice to which the UE is assigned; and a subset of antenna elements having a specific arrangement reserved for the network slice.

[0091] In a subsequent step 530, the AASF 126 transmits to the RRU 124 the identity of each antenna element in the identified subset of antenna elements assigned to the identified network slice of the UE, and the AASF instructs the RRU 124 to transmit network communications using only antenna elements belonging to the subset of antenna elements.

[0092] In a final step 540, the RRU causes only the identified subset of antenna elements to transmit network communications to the UE 110 and does not instruct the remaining antenna elements to do so.

[0093] In this way, when transmitting to a UE using more distally disposed antenna elements, wireless signal detection can be improved by providing more different propagation paths, the results of which (e.g., a greater range of "arrival times") can be processed by the UE to improve various aspects of signal detection according to methods known in the art.

[0094] Replacements and modifications

[0095] In the above, the telecommunications network 100 is generally shown and described as a cellular wide area network. However, in an alternative, the telecommunications network is any type of telecommunications network, including other forms of wide area networks (such as satellite networks), wireless local area networks, or a combination of network types.

[0096] In an alternative example, the instruction received by the radio access point 115 also includes a priority. The AASF 126 then allocates antenna elements to network slices in a prioritized manner based on the received priority indication; this includes transferring antenna elements that have been reserved for lower priority network slices to the new high priority network slice.

[0097] Although network orchestrator 170 is illustrated as a single entity within the core network for simplicity, it should be understood that network orchestrator 170 may include various separate entities, such as separate and distributed orchestrators for different domains of the telecommunications network (e.g., for the core network, the transport network, the RAN, and for individual radio access points.) These separate components of the core network may be used to communicate in order to provide end-to-end (i.e., between the radio access points and the core network) orchestration, including facilitating end-to-end orchestration.

[0098] It should be understood that the multi-antenna array 120 can be used to be separated into multiple subsets of antenna elements, wherein each subset is reserved for a different network slice (or subset of network slices), and wherein the arrangement of the antenna elements in each subset can be different.

[0099] The subset of antenna elements reserved for the network slice may include at least two antenna elements. At least one antenna element may be used for non-reserved such that no network slice has exclusive use of the antenna element. In this way, network communications for UEs not assigned to the network slice may be transmitted via at least one non-reserved antenna element.

[0100] In yet another alternative example, a given antenna element may be reserved for at least two network slices and unavailable to other network slices. In this way, an antenna element may be shared between subsets of network slices.

[0101] Each feature disclosed herein and (where appropriate) part of the claims and drawings may be provided independently or in any appropriate combination.

Claims

1. A method of operating a radio access point, the radio access point providing a radio access network for a telecommunications network, the radio access point comprising a plurality of antenna elements, the method comprising the steps of: determining performance requirements for a network slice to which a user equipment UE of the telecommunication network is allocated; selecting a spatial arrangement of a subset of the plurality of antenna elements based on the determined performance requirement; Reserving the selected subset for use only by the network slice; as well as Network communications are transmitted between the radio access point and the UE using only the subset of antenna elements.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein: Transmitting the network communication further comprises the following steps: receiving, at the radio access point, a wireless signal from the UE; and identifying the network slice to which the UE is assigned, thereby determining the subset of antenna elements; and Aperture synthesis of the wireless signal is performed using individual antenna elements in the subset.

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein: Performing aperture synthesis includes measuring the amplitude and phase of the wireless signal with the aid of individual antenna elements in the subset.

4. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein: Transmitting the network communication also includes transmitting wireless signals from the radio access point to the UE using only individual antenna elements in the subset.

5. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein: A separation distance between at least two antenna elements in the subset is selected based on the performance requirements.

6. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein: Based on the performance requirements, a region enclosed by a subset of the antenna elements in the subset is selected.

7. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein: Selecting the spatial arrangement further comprises selecting the subset to have at least one axis of symmetry.

8. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, wherein: Selecting the spatial arrangement further comprises selecting a ratio of the subset of antenna elements arranged in linear alignment.

9. A method according to any one of the preceding claims, further comprising the step of selecting the number of antenna elements used to populate the subset, wherein: The number is selected based on the performance requirements.

10. The method according to any one of claims 1 to 8, further comprising the step of selecting the number of antenna elements used to populate the subset, wherein: The number is selected independently of the performance requirements.

11. A computer readable carrier medium containing a computer program which, when executed by a computer, causes the computer to perform the steps according to any one of the preceding claims.

12. A radio access point, the radio access point comprising: multiple antenna elements; A processor, the processor being configured to: determining performance requirements for a network slice to which a user equipment UE of the telecommunications network is allocated; as well as selecting a spatial arrangement of a subset of the plurality of antenna elements based on the determined performance requirement; a controller configured to reserve the selected subset for use only by the network slice; as well as A transmitter is configured to transmit network communications between the radio access point and the UE using only the subset of antenna elements.

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