Ericsson has partnered with Deutsche Telekom and Cosmote to trial and test W-band as 5G backhaul spectrum, announced Ericsson on Tuesday.
In trials at Deutsche Telekom’s Mobile Backhaul Service Center in Cosmote headquarters, Athens, the partners successfully proved the viability of frequency bands beyond 100GHz, such as W-band, for multi-gigabit wireless backhaul capacities for 5G and 6G.
5G’s increasing capacity demands also apply to transport. Just as radio access networks are starting to use higher frequencies such as 26GHz and 28GHz to allow more capacity, wireless backhaul is also looking into the possibility of higher frequencies with broader channels to enable greater capacities. Wireless backhaul currently uses frequency bands from 4GHz to 80GHz to support 5G transport requirements.
The joint field trial demonstrated for the first time a W-band wireless hop over a 1.5km range with telecom grade availability using pre-commercial equipment. This W-band hop was installed parallel with a 1.5km E-band hop, to show that the W-band has a similar long-term performance to E-band. The trial recorded speeds of 5.7Gbps over the 1.5km distance and topped10Gbps over 1km hops.
The result proved that W-band (92GHz -114GHz) can perform on the same level as the E-band (70/80GHz), which is currently the only frequency band supporting 10Gbps wireless backhaul capacities for 4G and 5G. The W-band is expected to add more untapped spectrum needed for high-capacity wireless transport.
Dr. Konstantinos Chalkiotis, VP 5G Solutions, Access & Home Networks, Deutsche Telekom
The evolution towards future-proof, cost-efficient and high-capacity wireless backhaul networks will play an important role to accommodate growing traffic demand, increased site location (including small and pico cells) and extend 5G services in the future.
Jonas Hansryd, Research Manager, Microwave Systems, Ericsson
Ericsson has a proud history of innovation with Deutsche Telekom. Two years ago, we showed for the first time the possibility to transport more than 100Gbps over a kilometer distance using millimeter wave bands.
