The Spanish telco said initial 5G launch in the United Kingdom will be followed by deployments in Spain and Germany
SHANGHAI–The U.K. will likely be the first market to see 5G services from Spanish telecommunications firm Telefonica, the operator’s global CTO Enrique Blanco told reporters during Mobile World Congress Shanghai. Blanco said the initial deployments will take place in the U.K., followed by Germany and Spain, in 2020 or 2021.
He added that the maturity in the deployment of 4G service will be key to decide the timeline for 5G deployments in Telefonica’s markets, noting that one of the telco’s current main priorities is to continue deploying LTE in order to expand coverage of this technology in the markets where the operator has a commercial presence.
“We will continue working to expand LTE in our markets and we will see the maturity of this technology in each market and the penetration rates. My forecast is that we may need to start with 5G deployments in the U.K, Spain and Germany due to the higher penetration rates in LTE technology,” Blanco said.
The executive said the operator expects to kick off deployments of commercial 5G in 2020 or 2021, although that’s not set in stone. “However, if any other operator decided to launch 5G earlier, we will be ready to compete and this will be a commercial decision,” he added.
“In Latin America we are doing a big effort in order to improve our fixed capabilities, in order to expand FTTH networks. In terms of future 5G deployments in this region, we will be initially launching in the main cities such as Sao Paulo, Buenos Aires, Santiago and maybe Lima.
Blanco said that Telefonica may start with the initial deployments of 5G technology in Latin America, 12 months after the first deployments in Europe, depending on the maturity of thes markets.
Telefonica ended the first quarter of the year with a total of 274 million mobile subscribers, according to the telco’s latest financial report. Global LTE customers reached 75.4 million at the end of March.
In the U.K market, Telefonica ended the period with a LTE penetration of 57.4%, followed by Spain, with nearly 43%, and Germany, with 31.9%. In Brazil, the telco’s overall LTE penetration reached 37% at and-Q1 while in the rest of the telco’s LatAm operations, LTE penetration totalled 15.5%
