AT&T Takes 5G Trials From the Lab to the Field

AT&T announced its first 5G business customer trial this week, the first of its kind, according to the company. Located at one of Intel’s Austin offices, AT&T, in cooperation with Intel and Ericsson, is utilizing millimeter wave (mmWave) technology to power the 5G network experience. 

In February of this year, AT&T laid out its roadmap for 5G, and based on that previous information, they seem to be on track. With lab testing apparently complete, the company is taking 5G into the field, with much more testing to be done in the future. For now, tests of 4K video streams, internet, and VPN will take place.

In terms of speed, AT&T says it is currently working with over 1 gigabit per second, which practically crushes the top speeds of 4G LTE. AT&T previously explained that with 5G, users could download an entire TV episode in just 3 seconds.

As detailed by AT&T, “During the trial, more than a gigabit per second bandwidth will let us test multiple enterprise proof of concept use cases. That includes internet access, VPN, Unified Communications applications and 4K video streams. The trial will showcase the potential of 5G VoIP over the 15GHz and 28GHz spectrum bands.”

While this news is groovy, consumers still don’t have a real timeframe for when to expect 5G rollout nationwide. It is coming, though.

Via: AT&T