Device and a method for providing neighboring cell lists for cells in a WCDMA network

A method in a first network node for providing a neighboring cell list for at least one first cell in a wireless telecommunications network, which at least one first cell is served by at least one second network node connected to the first network node, the method comprising:

• collecting information about a number of bursts of soft handover events and/or a number of radio link addition attempts for user equipments located in the at least one first cell to one or more cells other than the at least one first cell, the number of bursts of soft handover events comprising a total number of events for a soft handover event that is collected by a General Performance Event Handling (GPEH) function from the users equipments in the first cell for one or more recording periods;
• determining a neighboring cell list for the at least one first cell based on one or more addition and/or removal thresholds related to the number of bursts of soft handover events and/or the number of radio link addition attempts for user equipments located in the at least one first cell to one or more cells other than the at least one first cell;
• and
• providing the determined neighboring cell list for the at least one first cell to the second network node serving the at least one first cell.

A method in a first network node for providing a first cell in a wireless telecommunications network with a list of neighboring cells, wherein the first cell is served by at least one second network node connected to the first network node, wherein a second cell is served by at least one third network node connected to the first network node, the method comprising:

• collecting information about a number of bursts of missing neighbor events and a number of soft handover signalling attempts for user equipments located in the first cell to one or more cells other than the first cell;
• determining a neighboring cell list for the first cell, wherein the determining comprises adding a second cell to the neighboring cell list for the first cell based on a ratio exceeding a first addition threshold, wherein the ratio is based on a number of bursts of missing neighbor events associated with the second cell and a total number of soft handover signalling attempts to cells of the wireless telecommunications network;
• determining a neighboring cell list for the second cell, wherein determining the neighboring cell list for the second cell comprises adding the first cell to the neighboring cell list for the second cell based on a determination that a number of neighboring cells on the neighboring cell list for the second cell is below a threshold, and based on a determination that backward relations between cells are allowed;
• providing the neighboring cell list for the first cell to the at least one second network node;
• and
• providing the neighboring cell list for the second cell to the at least one third network node.