Bouygues Telecom teams with Ericsson for 5G demo
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Bouygues Telecom teams with Ericsson for 5G demo

Bouygues Telecom has partnered with Ericsson to demonstrate 5G download speeds topping 25Gbps at a French innovation day.

Bouygues used two prototype mobile devices, simultaneously linked up to an Ericsson base station, to show off data transfers with an average throughput surpassing 25.2Gbps and a latency of just 3ms.

It is one of a number of demonstrations and upgrades for the French operator as it prepares for 5G. It is also upgrading its sites with fibre links, rolling out cloud RAN network technology, and virtualising its core network.

“Having established its leadership in France 4G technology, Bouygues Telecom intends to maintain its technological lead with the rollout of 5G planned for 2020,” said Yves Legrand, chief technical officer, EVP at Bouygues Telecom.

Ericsson’s 5G antenna used beamforming technology and massive multiple input, multiple output (MIMO) at centimetre-wave frequencies, allowing the Swedish vendor to direct specific signal at each of the devices individually.

This, according to Ericsson, allows each device to have its own “mini-cell”, moving with them, giving the highest possible bandwidth.

“In evolution of existing 4G networks, 5G will enable us to meet demand for very high-speed mobile broadband capacity, support massive interconnection of IoT devices, and achieve the ultralow latency required for critical connections between machines and with vehicles,” said Franck Bouétard, head of Ericsson France. 

“5G is also an excellent opportunity, as we have shown with Bouygues Telecom, to deliver ultra high-definition video streaming and virtual and augmented reality to mobile devices and homes.”

Ericsson is attempting to position itself at the forefront of 5G, which is expected to be deployed globally from 2020 onward. At this year’s Mobile World Congress, it demonstrated remoting driving from 70km using 5G in a partnership with Telefonica.

Ericsson has also teamed up with BT and Kings College London to launch a 5G partnership in the UK.

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