Category: 5G News

T-Mobile and Sprint have agreed to merge, but they still need approval from regulatory agencies before they can move forward. With all of the current focus on  5G – in particular the race against countries like China to be the first in 5G – T-Mobile and Sprint leaders are emphasizing the benefit that their merger could have on 5G development in an effort to encourage approval. “It’s the early innovation cycle of 5G,” T-Mobile chief executive John Legere said after the deal was announced. “We are behind China. This is not something we can allow.”

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AT&T has been working with small businesses in three US cities over the past year to trial their 5G network (which they plan to deploy in 12 cities by the end of the year), and today they released the results of some of their testing:

• In Waco, Texas, AT&T 5G speeds were 1.2Gbps from 500 feet over a 400MHz channel, with 9-12 millisecond latency.
• In Kalamazoo, Michigan, they saw 1Gbps speeds at 900 feet (275 meters) in “line of sight” conditions.
• From their South Bend, Indiana, tests, no specific speeds were reported, but reported “gigabit wireless speeds” in line of sight and “some nonline of sight” conditions.

Other interesting notes from the release were that there appeared to be no negative impact from rain or snow, and large numbers of users were connected during the tests. They also reported that signals can penetrate “significant foliage, glass and even walls” even better than they had expected.

AT&T’s tests are definitely very promising, and we can’t wait to see the network deployed to the public!

The race to be one of the first providers to offer 5G service is worldwide, with carriers around the globe clamoring to be able to tout their networks’ availability. Here in the US, Verizon has announced plans to launch a limited 5G network this year, but some other carriers are skeptical. When Korea Telecom announced plans this week to make their 5G service available in 2019, they commented that Verizon’s promised 5G network is actually “a step backward,” since it will not provide broad coverage. As a KT executive Oh Seong-Mok explained, “it is true 5G only when coverage is guaranteed,” so because Verizon’s 2018 launch will not provide nationwide coverage, the door remains open for KT’s launch to be the first true 5G service in the world.

While KT has a point, launching a nationwide network in a country the size of the US is no small task – and if Verizon delivers on their promise to launch 5G in some areas this year, it will still be a huge step in wireless.

This Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will vote on proposed rules seeking to streamline wireless infrastructure deployment. This Order, and its passage, comes at a critical time in America’s infrastructure story. The United States has historically focused modernization efforts on physical assets including roads, bridges and highways. But, to unlock significant economic and life-changing consumer benefits, we must prioritize the modernization of next-generation wireless networks.

The current U.S. landscape with 4G wireless has given way to successful innovations in our burgeoning Internet of Things (IoT) world. Yet, it won’t hold a candle to what is to come if we can successfully usher in the next stage of connectivity, i.e., 5G wireless broadband services.

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UK mobile operator O2 released a report this week titled “The value of 5G for cities and communities,” detailing the anticipated positive impacts 5G will have in a variety of sectors. The report utilizes research and examples rooted in the UK,  but the message is global: the integration of 5G technology in any city or town could mean billions of dollars in savings and increased productivity.

The report illustrates potential benefits everywhere from healthcare to transportation to energy. Leveraging 5G to enable widespread adoption of video conferencing by medical professionals, for example, would allow doctors to offer remote consultations when office visits are not necessary and would improve post-hospitalization patient monitoring. In the transportation industry, 5G sensors would enable predictive maintenance to reduce train delays and cancellations. The possibilities are virtually endless, and so are the benefits!

Read the O2 report (pdf)

Donald Trump cited security concerns as the reason behind his executive order blocking Broadcom’s proposed acquisition of Qualcomm, and it appears that it’s Qualcomm’s 5G knowledge and research that US leaders are concerned about. Qualcomm has been a leader in the fledgling – but extremely important – 5G arena, and US experts may not want that expertise and advantage to be lost to the Singapore-based Broadcom. This move is certainly in line with other decisions Trump has made to penalize or block foreign interest in certain industries, so it seems likely that the motive for the decision may be purely political and not actually influenced by legitimate 5G-related security concerns.

Read more at Cnet

5G was the hot topic at last week’s Mobile World Congress, with carriers and manufacturers of everything from laptops to smartphones showing off their plans and visions for a 5G future. A less flashy but arguably more important demonstration was made by National Instruments, who demonstrated their 5G New Radio (NR) sub-6GHz emulator as a solution to lower testing costs and improve time-to-market for carriers and modem and hardware manufacturers.

Testing hardware and software like the offerings from National Instruments are critical to getting 5G equipment to market, particularly while the technology and the adopted standards are so new. National Instruments’ emulator can be programmed to behave like different modems and simulate various RF conditions, allowing engineers to test their 5G equipment in a world that does not yet have 5G.

To show off their solution at Mobile World Congress, National Instruments partnered with Samsung to demonstrate NI’s test user equipment communicating with Samsung’s 5G NR 28GHz base station. The demonstration showed the test equipment connecting to the base station and validating the downlink quality and performance. For carriers and manufacturers alike, it was a hugely exciting peek into how NI’s technology will help push the progress of 5G and 5G equipment.

5G cellular networks may not be accessible to the masses just yet, but manufacturers are prepping for them so that consumers will have equipment that can take advantage of the new technology as soon as 5G lights up. Intel has announced that their XMM 8000 series 5G modems will be included in laptops and netbooks from Dell, HP, Lenovo and Microsoft by the second half of 2019.

Once carriers like AT&T and Verizon have deployed their 5G networks, users of products like netbooks that have 5G-capable modems like the XMM 8000 series will be able to take advantage of the superior speeds and latency that 5G will deliver. Intel plans to demo one of these devices at Mobile World Congress next week to show off the capabilities and hopefully encourage early adoption. It also seems likely that Intel may partner with phone manufacturers as well, pushing for their 5G modems to be used in future smartphones.

2019 is sure to be a race between both component manufacturers like Intel and hardware manufacturers to get 5G-capable devices in consumer’s hands. It will be exciting to see how the competition spurs development!

4K video streaming 5G test used 28 GHz spectrum

Earlier this month, inside a Nokia facility in Murray Hill, N.J., the network infrastructure vendor worked with Verizon and Qualcomm to complete what is being billed as the first over-the-air call based on 3GPP’s non-standalone 5G New Radio specification and using licensed millimeter wave spectrum.

Verizon, based on its acquisition of licenses previously held by XO Communications, has licensed millimeter wave spectrum holdings in the 28 GHz and 39 GHz bands. This test used 28 GHz spectrum, according to Verizon spokesman John O’Malley, and transmitted a 4K video stream. “With the bandwidth 5G provides on millimeter wave spectrum, we felt 4K video was the best application to showcase the technology versus an over-the-top voice call,” O’Malley said in a statement to RCR Wireless News.