On the applicability of the SBC codec to support super-wideband speech in Bluetooth handsfree communications

With the recent standardization of the Enhanced Voice Services (EVS) codec in 3GPP, mobile operators can upgrade their voice services to offer super-wideband (SWB) audio quality (with 32 kHz sampling rate). There is however one important use case which is currently limited by existing standards: hands free communication with wireless headsets, car kits, or connected audio devices often rely on Bluetooth, and the hands free-profile (HFP) in Bluetooth is currently limited to narrowband and wideband speech. Following the approach used to extend HFP to support wideband, we study in this paper the applicability of the SBC codec to further extend HFP to SWB. An evaluation of performance is provided taking into account Bluetooth system constraints.