AT&T announced that it is now working with Nokia to expand its 5G lab trial work. The second largest mobile operator in the US said that it has begun system and software architecture lab work in Middletown, Atlanta and San Ramon, in addition to its existing 5G trials in Austin and Texas.
By the end of this summer, AT&T expects to conduct outdoor 5G wireless connectivity trials to fixed locations in cities such as Austin, Texas and Middletown to deliver multi-gigabit wireless speeds 10-100 times faster than today’s average 4G LTE wireless connections.
AT&T said that it is structuring the 5G trials in such a way that it is able to contribute to the international 5G standards development and pivot to compliant commercial deployments once standards are set by 3GPP which is expected to likely complete the first phase of standards-setting process in 2018.
Nokia will be supplying test equipment for a variety of 5G technology building blocks and features, supporting AT&T to define the features, capabilities and test cases for trials. A variety of 5G technologies are factored into the operator's tests, including sub-6Hz and mmWave spectrum use, low latency, advanced beamforming and very high throughput.
Tom Keathley, senior vice president – wireless network architecture and design, AT&T
Nokia is joining to help us test millimeter wave (mmWave), which we expect to play a key role in 5G development and deployment. The work coming out of AT&T Labs will pave the way toward future international 5G standards and allow us to deliver these fast 5G speeds and network performance across the U.S.
