Telecom major Airtel and equipment maker Huawei said on Friday that they have conducted India’s first trial of the 5G network, PTI reported. The trial achieved a network speed of over three gigabit per second.
The trial was conducted at Airtel’s network experience centre in Gurgaon’s Manesar area. “This is a small but a very significant step in our journey towards 5G,” Bharti Airtel Director (Networks) Abhay Savargaonkar said. “The promise of 5G is endless. It will be a game changer and will change the way we live, work and engage.”
The Airtel official added that three gigabit per second was the highest speed for a mobile network in the 3.5 gigahertz band with a 100 megahertz bandwidth. 5G offers potential for services such as Internet of Things services, augmented reality and virtual reality which can be delivered using the new technology, Savargaonkar said.
“We have been focusing on developing the 5G ecosystem,” Huawei Director (Wireless Marketing) Emmanuel Coelho Alves said. “The show with Bharti Airtel impressively demonstrates the performance capability of 5G in the 3.5 gigahertz band.”
In September 2017, the Narendra Modi government created a Rs 500 crore corpus to support the rollout of 5G network in the country by 2020. The 5G technology aims to deliver about 10 gigabits per second in urban areas and 1 gigabit per second in rural regions.
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