T-Mobile Austria and Huawei Austria have demonstrated VoLTE call continuity using the Enhanced Single Radio Voice Call Continuity (eSRVCC) specification as outlined in 3GPP Release 10. eSRVCC is designed to speed up handover times for calls between LTE and 3G.
The two companies used test devices running Qualcomm's Snapdragon S4 processor MSM8960 chipset. Although Huawei announced a successful lab test of eSRVCC last month, it said that this test "represents a significant milestone in the introduction of voice calls via LTE in Europe". The test calls were carried out at T-Mobile Austria and Huawei's Innovation Center in Vienna on Friday, October 12, 2012.
T-Mobile Austria CTO Rüdiger Köster said: “Our successful pilot project showed that not only rapid data transfer, but also Voice over LTE technology is ready for wide spread commercial use. Huawei and Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. clearly proved their credentials and demonstrated their problem-solving expertise during the course of the venture with T-Mobile."
SRVCC, as specified in 3GPP R8, works by keeping a call alive whilst a user moves from LTE coverage to 3G. eSRVCC, outlined in R10, is designed to make call interruption times shorter by introducing a new functional element and gateway in the network that truncate the session control (signalling) and bearer connections.