EE announced a small trial of 5G ultrafast broadband at 10 sites around London’s Tech City in October 2018. Its test customers will be five small businesses and five homes.
EE previously announced that they are looking to launch 5G in late 2019. The company has long been a member of the 5G Innovation Centre, University of Surrey. These innovations are beginning to sound like smart city ideas where connectivity and energy is literally embedded into the infrastructure of the city. Professor Andy Sutton, speaking to The Telegraph, said: “Imagine a scenario where you’re putting up a new building and there are a number of bricks in that building. Why don’t we replace a number of those bricks with things that look like bricks, but are actually mobile transmitters?” Sutton envisages a time when 5G delivers speeds of up to 100Gbit/s.
O2 critiqued early launches of 5G by noting that any launches prior to 2020 were going to be what it calls “a lite” version that lack key features. Operators are expected to launch with what is called a ‘non-standalone’ architecture, which will lack capabilities such as super low latency, vehicle communications for autonomous driving, enhanced security and so on.
