EE highlighted its first 5G small cells are now live as part of a trial taking place in the London Borough of Croydon
U.K. telco EE, owned by BT Group, confirmed it has already deployed over 1,000 small cells across the country, with 400 new deployments over the last 12 months, including its first 5G sites recently installed in Croydon, London.
EE said that these small cells are being installed on everyday street infrastructure including BT’s iconic red phone kiosks and digital street hubs, as well as lampposts and other furniture.
In the last year, EE said it has expanded its 4G small cell portfolio to towns and cities including Cardiff, Dundee, Luton, Norwich and Stoke-on-Trent.
EE highlighted that its first 5G small cells are now live as part of a trial taking place in the London Borough of Croydon. The trial included seven 5G sites, the telco said.
EE noted that it uses advanced network analytics to identify specific locations which would benefit the deployment of small cells. EE is currently working with Nordic vendors Nokia and Ericsson to deploy the small cell solutions, which reduce congestion and enable customers to benefit from speeds of up to 300 Mbps for 4G cells and 600 Mbps for 5G.
EE currently combines licensed 1.8 GHz and 2.6 GHz spectrum with unlicensed 5 GHz spectrum in its 4G small cells. The new 5G small cells in Croydon are configured with licensed 1.8 GHz spectrum for 4G and 3.5 GHz for 5G.
Greg McCall, chief networks officer at BT Group, said: “Small cells are an integral component within our mobile network, ensuring that even in the busiest places our customers have access to the full performance of the U.K.’s best network. To reach 1,000 deployments, including our first 5G sites, demonstrates our commitment to delivering unrivalled mobile connectivity to all four corners of the U.K.”
“This is great news for Croydon – we’re delighted to be the first town in the U.K. to be trialing 5G small cells with EE, bringing the latest mobile connectivity to our borough. These 5G small cells will improve the network capacity in high-usage areas, giving faster download speeds for our residents, businesses and visitors,” said Jason Perry, Executive Mayor of Croydon.
Last month, BT Group and Nokia announced that they have successfully aggregated 5G Standalone (SA) spectrum using 5CC carrier aggregation (5CC CA).
Nokia noted that BT Group became the first European operator to achieve this milestone. The testing used a device powered by a Snapdragon 5G Modem-RF system from Qualcomm Technologies.
Nokia highlighted that 5CC CA will significantly boost the data rates available to customers in areas of high demand by combining all mid-band radio spectrum when the 5G SA device requires a high-speed connection.
In February, BT Group, Ericsson and Qualcomm Technologies said they had successfully demonstrated end-to-end consumer and enterprise 5G differentiated connectivity enabled by network slicing.
The 5G demo was carried out using Ericsson’s 5G Core and radio access network technology in the U.K. with devices powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 for Galaxy mobile platform.
