The CEO of China Mobile Li Yue has confirmed that the operator will use the FDD LTE strand in addition to the TDD strand. The move is reportedly aimed at encouraging the spread of dual-mode, multi-band devices.
The firm’s adoption of TD-LTE will be welcomed by other supporters of the technology – operators with such high numbers of subscribers are as seen as instrumental in encouraging uptake.
China Mobile is currently running extensive trials of TD-LTE covering ten major cities. This figure is expected to reach 100 over the course of 2013, expanding coverage to around 35% of the population and increasing the current number of base stations from 20,000 to 200,000.
The operator has reportedly already launched a dual TD/FDD network in Hong Kong in December last year. It operates using the 2330-2360MHz bands for TD-LTE, and the 2555-2570MHz and 2675-2690MHz bands for FDD-LTE.
