South Korea spending $1.5 billion for 5G network
South Korea Plans 5G Mobile Networks by 2020
Samsung develops key 5G mobile network technology; No. of global LTE subscribers exceeds 100 mil.
Korea's Samsung Electronics announced on Sunday,.. that its R&D department developed a key 5G technology,.. for the first time,.. in the world...
Park Ji-won has details.
5G, or fifth-generation mobile network,.. will offer a communication speed that is hundreds of times faster than the current 4G system.
And it seems Korea's electronic giant and the world's largest smartphone maker Samsung is poised to spearhead the development of this new generation of mobile communication.
Samsung Electronics announced Sunday,.. that it succeeded in developing a key fifth-generation technology,.. which will allow users to download a two-hour film in one second.
The new data transfer technique allows users to access information,.. at a speed of up to tens of gigabits per second,.. which is hundreds of times faster than the current fourth-generation network.
The electronics giant said,.. it used super-high-frequency bands,.. much above the normal telecommunication spectrum band,... to realize the data transfer speed.
Samsung added,.. it aims to commercialize the fifth-generation network to consumers by 2020.
While many European and Chinese businesses and governments are making large-scale investments in the 5G market,.. Samsung aims to solidify its position as a leader in the fifth generation technology.
Meanwhile,.. the number of 4G, or LTE, network subscribers recently exceeded 100 million globally.
U.S.-based research firm Wireless Intelligence said,.. that the number of global LTE subscribers from 70 countries now exceeds 100 million.
This record has been set in just three and a half years,.. since the LTE network was first commercialized in late 2009.
Subscribers from five countries,.. namely Korea, Japan, U.S., Canada, and Australia,.. account for about 90 percent of the total number of 4G global subscribers.
They expect LTE subscriptions to pass one billion in 2018,.. considering that countries like China and India with large populations ... are planning to launch the service in the near future.
Park Ji-won, Arirang News.
World's fastest wireless network launches in South Korea and you can download a movie in 40 seconds
South Korea's largest mobile operator is launching what it says is the world's fastest wireless network this week.
The LTE-Advanced network can download data at speeds twice as fast as 4G networks and 10 times faster than 3G services, according to SK Telecom Co.
With a transfer rate of 150 megabits per seconds, the network can download an 800 megabyte movie in just 43 seconds. This compares with around 80 seconds on the current LTE network.
The service will be initially available in Seoul and its suburbs.
South Korea has witnessed rapid growth of the fourth-generation LTE, or Long Term Evolution, service as the country's mobile phone users are quick to adopt faster wireless technologies
More than 60 per cent of South Korea's 33 million smartphone users have subscribed to the LTE service.
GSA, an association of network suppliers, projects that LTE networks will be available in 87 countries by the end of 2013.
The LTE-Advanced technology, however, has room for improvement. While it boasts the fastest download speed, its upload speed is same as LTE networks at 37.5 mbps.
There is no indication that such a speedy network will be available in the UK soon. Currently Everything Everywhere offers an LTE or 4G network with top speeds of around 80Mbps in some cities.
To accompany the launch of the world's first LTE-Advanced network, the world's largest smartphone manufacturer, Samsung Electronics, has released the Galaxy S4 LTE-A handset.
The smartphone is the first model produced to run on the country's super fast LTE-A network.
SK Telecom plans to roll out a total of 7 LTE-A compatible handsets in the second half of 2013, with LG Electronics also poised to launch similar smartphones for the network before 2014, according to South Korean news agency, Yonhap.
