Singapore telco also demonstrated end-to-end low latency live video streaming over ‘5G’
Singapore telecommunications operator Singtel and Swedish vendor Ericsson carried out what the companies claim to be the first live demo of potential of 5G technologies in Southeast Asia.
The demo used Ericsson’s 5G radio prototypes, achieving a peak throughput of 27.5 gigabits per second and latency as low as 2 milliseconds. Singtel and Ericsson also demonstrated the world’s first end-to-end low latency live video streaming over 5G.
“Singapore is at the forefront of the most connected cities in the world and now we want to take it to the next level. 5G is very important to the Singtel Group as it will support advanced communication needs. To ensure the Singtel Group continues our technology leadership in the mobile communications domain, we are exploring, studying and trialing pre-5G technologies with Ericsson,” Singtel’s CTO Tay Soo Meng, said.
Singtel is in the process of deploying pre-5G technologies such as LTE-Advanced and also plans to deploy LTE-Advanced Pro.
Ericsson’s radio prototypes enable operators, ecosystem partners, academics and analysts to test 5G capabilities live. Some key capabilities of the prototypes include multipoint connectivity with distributed multiple-input, multiple-output and 5G-LTE dual connectivity.
Singtel ended last year with 4.1 million mobile subscribers, including 2.2 million LTE subscribers, and a 50% overall market share. The telco had initially launched commercial LTE services in December 2011. Singtel offers the LTE service through spectrum in the 900 MHz, 1800 MHz and 2.6 GHz bands.
KDDI posts revenue of $11.1B in fiscal Q1; ends June with 46.6M subscribers
In other APAC news, Japanese telco KDDI reported operating revenue of 1.130 trillion yen ($11.11 billion) for its fiscal first quarter ended June 30, up 8% compared to the same quarter last year. The telco’s net profit attributable to shareholders grew 16.1% to 167.11 billion yen.
KDDI reported a total of 46.590 million subscribers in the mobile telephony segment at the end of June, after a net addition of 221,000 subscribers in fiscal Q1. The operator also had 3.8 million fiber-to-the-home users at the end of the period.
KDDI provides a diverse portfolio including managed networks, data centers, cloud, security and system integration.
The Japanese operator initially launched commercial 4G LTE services in September 2012. The telco currently operates spectrum in the 700 MHz, 800 MHz, 1500 MHz, 2.1 GHz and 2.6 GHz bands.
