An Upper Bound on the Sum Capacity of the Downlink Multicell Processing with Finite Backhaul Capacity

In this paper, we study upper bounds on the sum capacity of the downlink multicell processing model with finite backhaul capacity for the simple case of 2 base stations and 2 mobile users. It is modeled as a two-user multiple access diamond channel. It consists of a first hop from the central processor to the base stations via orthogonal links of finite capacity, and the second hop from the base stations to the mobile users via a Gaussian interference channel. The upper bound is derived using the converse tools of the multiple access diamond channel and that of the Gaussian MIMO broadcast channel. Through numerical results, it is shown that our upper bound improves upon the existing upper bound greatly in the medium backhaul capacity range, and as a result, the gap between the upper bounds and the sum rate of the time-sharing of the known achievable schemes is significantly reduced.