Wireless communication networks are widely deployed to provide various communication services such as telephony, video, data, messaging, broadcasts, and so on. Such networks, which are usually multiple access networks, support communications for multiple users by sharing the available network resources. One example of such a network is the UMTS Terrestrial Radio Access Network (UTRAN). The UTRAN is the radio access network (RAN) defined as a part of the Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS), a third generation (3G) mobile phone technology supported by the 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP). The UNITS, which is the successor to Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) technologies, currently supports various air interface standards, such as Wideband-Code Division Multiple Access (W-CDMA), Time Division-Code Division Multiple Access (TD-CDMA), and Time Division-Synchronous Code Division Multiple Access (TD-SCDMA). The UMTS also supports enhanced 3G data communications protocols, such as High Speed Packet Access (HSPA), which provides higher data transfer speeds and capacity to associated UMTS networks.
Multi-subscriber identity module (SIM) wireless devices have become increasing popular because of their flexibility in service options and other features. One type of multi-SIM wireless device, a dual-SIM dual-standby (DSDS) device, enables both SIMs to be in idle mode waiting to begin communications, but only allows one SIM at a time to participate in an active communication due to sharing of a single radio frequency (RF) resource (e.g., transceiver). Other multi-SIM devices that extend this capability to more than two SIMs are referred to as multi-SIM, multi-standby (MSMS) devices, and may be configured with any number of SIMs greater than two (i.e., multi-SIM multi-standby wireless devices).
Multi-SIM wireless devices can have multiple subscriptions to one or more wireless networks. For example, in a DSDS device, a first subscription may support networks using a first technology standard, such as Long Term Evolution (LTE) or Wideband Code Division Multiple Access (WCDMA), while a second subscription may support a second technology standard, such as Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) Enhanced Data rates for GSM Evolution (EDGE) (also referred to as GERAN). A DSDS device enables both SIMs to be in idle mode waiting to begin communications on their respective networks, but only allows one SIM at a time to participate in an active communication due to sharing of a single RF resource (e.g., a transceiver) configured to both communication technologies.