The communication and technology giants AT&T, Samsung Electronics America (SEA) and Samsung Austin Semiconductor (SAS) have announced that they will join forces to create America’s first 5G Innovation Zone, focusing on the use of 5G in manufacturing. The Innovation Zone will be located in Samsung Austin Semiconductor’s 160-acre campus in Austin, Texas, one of the most advanced semiconductor facilities in the world. The goal behind this innovative project is to explore the futuristic idea of a Smart Factory, powered by 5G technology. “This is a first. We’ll be testing the real-world impact 5G will have on the manufacturing industry,” commented Mo Katibeh, the CEO at AT&T Business. “Ultimately, we plan to use what we learn from this 5G Innovation Zone to help create better technology experiences and improvements in Samsung Austin Semiconductor’s plant along with creating a future blueprint for people and businesses across all industries.” By…
A German mobile network testing company, Rohde & Schwarz, have announced in their recent press release the upcoming launch of the first commercially available 5G New Radio (NR) measurement solution. The product will be displayed at the Mobile World Congress Americas taking place from 12 to 14 September, 2018 in Los Angeles. This pioneering developer of test and measurement equipment for 5G will present their 5G NR network measurement solution, that allows 5G users and regulators to measure 5G NR network coverage accurately. In addition, users will have the ability to verify the correct operation of beamforming and interworking between 5G and other technologies. This new solution consists of a network scanner with 5G NR scanning software, and the unique R&S ROMES4 Drive Test Software suite. Users will have two options for the test scanners: the compact R&S TSME6 Drive Test Scanner, or the R&S TSMA6 Autonomous Mobile Network Scanner…
Nokia has signed an agreement with the European Investment Bank (EIB) for a loan of 500 million Euros (572 million US dollars) to accelerate the development of cutting edge 5G technology. This loan, supported by the European Fund for Strategic Investments (EFSI), will present opportunities for the Finnish telecom equipment manufacturer to invest in the research, development and innovation of the soon-to-be telecommunication standard technology, thereby expanding the market and displaying the potential of 5G in Europe. “We have to understand that China and the US have moved fast with the 5G. It is very important to have European companies going in for this competition,” commented the EIB vice president Alexander Stubb in the online Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat. While the specific uses for the funds have not yet been identified, it is clear that Nokia’s end-to-end network will greatly benefit from this loan by ensuring the connectivity and reliability…
The global telecommunications solutions provider ZTE and the mobile operator Hutchinson Drei Austria announced another strategic step to expand their partnership in preparation for the 5G rollout in Austria. The cooperation between mobile operators and telecommunications equipment providers is fundamental for the implementation of this cutting-edge technology, and a Joint Innovation Lab initiative was launched to develop, test and optimize the latest 5G technology solutions. The ten-year partnership between ZTE Austria and Hutchinson Drei Austria has already shown great results in upgrading the network for higher quality standards and service improvements, as demonstrated in the most recent Pre-5G trials in Austria. “The first result of the joint innovation initiative was the successful evaluation of the Pre-5G technology, which enabled us to create a commercial Pre-5G in Vienna already at the beginning of this year. This move was a breakthrough in the European telecoms market, which made Austria a true 5G…
While 5G maintains its dominant position in telecom news headlines, Qualcomm has made a major move towards the realization of this disruptive technology with the announcement of the first fully-integrated QTM052 5G NR mmWave and QPM56xx sub-6 GHz RF modules for mobile devices. These antennas will be used in conjunction with the Snapdragon X50 5G module to achieve the stellar target speeds of 5G networks. “Qualcomm Technologies’ early investment in 5G has allowed us to deliver to the industry a working mobile mmWave solution that was previously thought unattainable, as well as a fully-integrated sub-6 GHz RF solution. Now, these type of modem-to-antenna solutions, spanning both mmWave and sub-6 spectrum bands, make mobile 5G networks and devices, especially smartphones, ready for large scale commercialization,” commented the president of Qualcomm Incorporated. Even though the mmWave signals can offer the critically higher speeds that are essential for this cutting-edge network, they can…
Amongst all the excitement of approaching 5G rollouts, the Finnish operator Elisa has grabbed the headlines by officially announcing that they are the first operator in the world to begin commercial use of a 5G network. Elisa’s first 5G network services were launched in Tampere (Finland) and Tallinn (Estonia). The first person to use the 5G network was Finland’s minister of Transport and Communications, Anne Berner, who made an international video call to Estonia’s minister of Economic Affairs and Infrastructure, Kadri Simson, using Huawei 5G terminal devices. Even though there are no commercial 5G-compatible devices available to the public, Elisa is already offering two types of 5G subscriptions. A significant hurdle that must be overcome for mass 5G rollouts is the issue of licensing. The Finish Ministry of Communications is set to allocate the first 5G licences for the 3.4-3.8 GHz bands in autumn, thereby enabling Finland to maintain their…
M1 will start testing 5G small cells at the end of the year. Those trials will be conducted in partnership with the Finnish company, Nokia. The main goal of those tests will be to give informations on the best way to install 5G small cells for a commercial purpose in a “dense cell grid architecture” and to validate the efficiency of low-latency for the “Internet of Things”. Denis Seek, CTO of M1 stated, “The practical learning from early 5G field trial is critical for the success of developing high-performance and demand-driven 5G services for our customers in future and enables us to play a key role in Singapore’s Smart Nation initiatives.” If Nokia has been working with M1 on network trials since 2016, it won’t be the only company working with the operator. The Chinese tech giant Huawei will also run trials with M1 by testing the 28GHz mmWave spectrum…
5G will be available for trial in seven cities across the UK. Birmingham, Bristol, Cardiff, Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, and London were selected to run the tests on the upcoming network. Those new infrastructures will be running the new 5G at the end of 2018 between October and December. Earlier this year, Vodafone paid £378 million, to get 50Mhz of the 3.4GHz spectrum. Nick Jeffery, Vodafone’s chief executive stated, “We want to make 5G and new fibre broadband services available to consumers and business throughout the UK, delivering a Gigabit society for all. We will also be bringing ultra-fast 4G to several hundred sites in hard to reach rural areas this year, building on our position as the network that offers the best voice coverage in the UK.” Vodafone’s goal is to launch a full 5G service in the UK by 2020, when 5G devices will be available on the market.
After years of hype, we are looking forward to the impending rollout of 5G networks. This transformational technology will lay the foundation for many future services and change how we view productivity. But how will 5G affect you? Speed and responsiveness It is not yet possible to state definitively what network speeds will be reachable, but it is fair to say that the biggest benefit of 5G to the average user will be the speed of this service. Early estimates have shown that data rates could be up to a thousand times faster than 4G, potentially exceeding 10 Gbps. In practical terms, everything we currently do on the Internet would be significantly faster, and these speeds would enable users to download an entire HD film in a few seconds. Responsiveness or latency refers to the time between a request and a response. The ultra-low latency of 5G will result in response…
The auction for 100MHz of spectrum in the 3.5GHz bandwidth were sold to SK Telecom and KT, and on the other hand, LG Uplus received 80MHz of spectrum in that same bandwidth. The total amount that was raised by the auction was a little lower than anticipated with $3.6 billion. The Ministry of Science and Information and communication technology sold by auction 280MHz of spectrum in the 3.5GHz bandwidth and will later sale 2,400MHz in the 28GHz band. 5G networks will certainly reach South Korean as one of its first market to be launched on. The next few months and years will be important for SK telecom and KT. They want to make sure that South Korea will be “first for 5G” with an expected March 2019 as a deadline to start launching the news high speed network.