Telecom regulator BIPT works with Ericsson to study suitable bands for 5G trials
The Belgian government has instructed the country’s telecom authority to open up spectrum to mobile operators seeking to conduct “5G” trials, local press reported.
Alexander De Croo, Belgium’s telecommunications minister, confirmed the government has given the green light to the Belgian Institute for Postal Services and Telecommunications to find spectrum that could be temporarily allocated to mobile operators and research centers looking to carry out 5G trials. According to reports, the regulator is currently working with Ericsson to analyze the most suitable bands for 5G technology.
The Belgian authorities have defined a number of conditions regulating the temporary licenses, including requiring Belgian researchers or startups must be involved in any 5G trial project.
Mobile operators in Belgium include Proximus, Orange and Base. Proximus and Orange currently offer LTE services through spectrum in the 800 MHz and 1800 MHz bands while Base offers the service via the 1800 MHz band.
Huawei, Proximus complete ‘4.5G’ demo
In related news, Proximus and Huawei completed a live demonstration of a 1.1 gigabit per second peak connection speed on a live mobile network. Huawei said the trial paves the way for future types of terminals and services such as 2K and 4K video, virtual reality, augmented reality and other services requiring gigabit connections provided by what it calls “4.5G” technology.
The trial combined Proximus’ 60 megahertz of spectrum across the 2.6 GHz, 2.1 GHz, 1800 MHz and 800 MHz bands.
“At Proximus, we believe the abundance of applications will require higher network performance in terms of speed, latency and number of simultaneous connections. Just look at all the applications in advanced telemedicine, connected cars or the all-pervasive media,” said Proximus CTO Geert Standaert.
