LTE trial success will lead to Nigerian rollout

Details: James Barton; Category: Wireless Networks; 17 December 2012; 8266 views

One the largest operators in Nigeria has successfully completed an LTE trial in the country’s capital city, Lagos...

One the largest operators in Nigeria has successfully completed an LTE trial in the country’s capital city, Lagos. As a result of this trial, Airtel Nigeria has declared that it is ready to trial the technology in other major cities across the country including Abuja and Port Harcourt.

LTE, widely accepted as the true 4G, is a standard for wireless communication of high-speed data for mobile phones and data terminals. It is based on advanced network technologies with a central focus of increasing the capacity and speed using a different radio interface together with enhanced core network.

The Lagos trial allowed users to access data-heavy services without slowdown, including opening simultaneous HD Videos on Youtube without buffering. Optimum conditions allowed download speeds of 37 Megabits per Second (Mbps), and even under non-ideal circumstances the network could achieve speeds of 32Mbps. Upload speed meanwhile was – 10.6Mbps.

Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Airtel Nigeria Rajan Swaroop said: “In the coming weeks, we shall take this success story to other parts of the country so that Nigerians will benefit from this innovation when finally unveiled.”

LTE is a truly global mobile phone standard for advanced mobile broadband. There is use of different frequency bands in different countries, which will mean that only multi-band phones will be able to use LTE in all countries where it is supported.

In February this year, Airtel Nigeria took a significant step to deepen its network capacity and quality when it announced the roll-out of widest 3.75G services across the 36 States in Nigeria and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. With the pan-Nigeria launch of 3.75G services, the widest and largest in the country, the company has improved customers’ experience with high speed mobile broadband and internet access, empowering telecoms consumers to watch live TV, download music, make video calls as well as send and receive emails using enabled devices.