ZTE, China Mobile demo NB-IoT verification
Chinese ICT services provider ZTE claims to be the first in the industry to demonstrate verification based on Narrowband-Internet of Things (NB-IoT) standards in China Mobile’s 5G innovation laboratory.
“Since the 3GPP NB-IoT standards are expected to be frozen late June, ZTE is following the 3GPP standardization carefully and is ready to launch a series of new technologies and products. This demonstration also showed ZTE’s innovation capability in IoT, which will enable the company to promote the rapid development of the NB-IoT ecosystem,” the Chinese company said in a statement.
ZTE said a network functions virtualization (NFV)-based virtual core network was used in this NB-IoT demonstration. The company also said that NB-IoT technologies will deliver ubiquitous cellular IoT coverage by 2020.
“The commercialization of NB-IoT greatly expands the possibilities of the communications industry. Together with its global partners, ZTE has been promoting and validating the NB-IoT technologies development, and has witnessed the large-scale commercialization of NB-IoT technologies.”
China Unicom to deploy NB-IoT trials this year
Building on Chinese leadership in this emerging area, China Unicom aims to conduct large-scale NB-IoT field trials in more than five cities in China this year, local press reported.
The telco expects to start commercial deployment of NB-IoT by the end of the year and reach nationwide coverage in 2018.
China Unicom’s Customer Department General Manager Tian Wenke said traditional cellular technology faces challenges in IoT applications such as coverage, battery life, service quality and module costs, which NB-IoT can solve. The executive said that China Unicom plans to run trials using the 900MHz and 1.8GHz spectrum bands.
China Unicom recently signed an agreement with the Shanghai municipal government to expand and upgrade its fixed optical network and wireless infrastructure in the city. The five-year agreement is valued at 14 billion yuan ($2.15 billion). The initiative, which seeks to turn Shanghai into a smart city, also includes the deployment of a citywide narrowband IoT platform for applications such as intelligent parking and environmental monitoring. The operator said the network is expected to be fully completed in 2017.
NTT DoCoMo, Nokia trial real time 8K video transmission using 5G radio access technology
In more APAC news, Japanese mobile operator NTT DoCoMo recently achieved what it claimed to be the world’s first wireless real-time transmission of 8K video deploying radio access technology for 5G mobile communications systems. The trial was conducted with Finnish vendor Nokia.
The transmission of ultra-high-resolution 8K video was achieved by a combination of an experimental system jointly developed by the Japanese company and Nokia.
In the trial, 8K video of 48 Gbps—a bit rate four times greater than 4K video and 32 times than full HD—was compressed by the encoder into signals ranging from 145Mbps to 85Mbps and successfully transmitted without delay.
NTT DoCoMo and Nokia have been collaborating since May 2014 to develop radio access technologies for future 5G mobile networks. Recent achievements include ultra-high-speed data transmission in excess of 2Gbps at the Roppongi Hills complex in Tokyo.
