AT&T announces plans to launch mobile 5G service in 12 cities by end of 2018
After the cellular industry agreed on specifications for the next-generation mobile 5G standard in December, AT&T on Wednesday announced plans to begin rolling out its own flavor of the speedy wireless technology by the end of 2018.
By launching in 12 U.S. markets by year's end, AT&T hopes to be the first major network to boast 5G connectivity options for consumers. The nation's second-largest wireless carrier by subscribers failed to disclose which cities will get access to mobile 5G.
AT&T claims it was one of the "key drivers" for acceleration of the 5G standard, key components of which were adopted by 3GPP, the international wireless standards body, last month. Device and parts manufacturers can now begin developing hardware to take advantage of the new specification, AT&T said.
Apple is undoubtedly working with partner suppliers to build 5G capabilities into a future iPhone. The tech giant filed an application with the Federal Communications Commission in May to start testing 5G connectivity, while reports in November suggested the company is working closely with Intel on potential 5G modem solutions.
"5G will change the way we live, work and enjoy entertainment," said Melissa Arnoldi, president, AT&T Technology and Operations. "We're moving quickly to begin deploying mobile 5G this year and start unlocking the future of connectivity for consumers and businesses. With faster speeds and ultra-low latency, 5G will ultimately deliver and enhance experiences like virtual reality, future driverless cars, immersive 4K video and more."
Alongside the mobile 5G rollout, AT&T will continue to build out its "5G Evolution" backbone beyond the 23 markets that currently have access to the service. Coverage will be expanded to include hundreds of metro areas, AT&T said.
A system that uses a mix of existing 4G technology to achieve faster speeds, "5G Evolution" does not meet 3GPP's 5G spec, but the network will serve as a foundation for the carrier's mobile 5G deployment later this year.
Additionally, AT&T will expand its LTE-LAA network to at least two dozen new metro areas in 2018.
AT&T is not alone in the race to 5G, as Sprint and T-Mobile have pegged network launch dates in 2019 and 2020, respectively. Verizon has been testing 5G since 2016, but has yet to announce a definitive rollout timeline.
By launching in 12 U.S. markets by year's end, AT&T hopes to be the first major network to boast 5G connectivity options for consumers. The nation's second-largest wireless carrier by subscribers failed to disclose which cities will get access to mobile 5G.
AT&T claims it was one of the "key drivers" for acceleration of the 5G standard, key components of which were adopted by 3GPP, the international wireless standards body, last month. Device and parts manufacturers can now begin developing hardware to take advantage of the new specification, AT&T said.
Apple is undoubtedly working with partner suppliers to build 5G capabilities into a future iPhone. The tech giant filed an application with the Federal Communications Commission in May to start testing 5G connectivity, while reports in November suggested the company is working closely with Intel on potential 5G modem solutions.
"5G will change the way we live, work and enjoy entertainment," said Melissa Arnoldi, president, AT&T Technology and Operations. "We're moving quickly to begin deploying mobile 5G this year and start unlocking the future of connectivity for consumers and businesses. With faster speeds and ultra-low latency, 5G will ultimately deliver and enhance experiences like virtual reality, future driverless cars, immersive 4K video and more."
Alongside the mobile 5G rollout, AT&T will continue to build out its "5G Evolution" backbone beyond the 23 markets that currently have access to the service. Coverage will be expanded to include hundreds of metro areas, AT&T said.
A system that uses a mix of existing 4G technology to achieve faster speeds, "5G Evolution" does not meet 3GPP's 5G spec, but the network will serve as a foundation for the carrier's mobile 5G deployment later this year.
Additionally, AT&T will expand its LTE-LAA network to at least two dozen new metro areas in 2018.
AT&T is not alone in the race to 5G, as Sprint and T-Mobile have pegged network launch dates in 2019 and 2020, respectively. Verizon has been testing 5G since 2016, but has yet to announce a definitive rollout timeline.
Comments
Assuming consumers continue to renew their phone every 30 months or so, which is big part of how Network can improve efficiency since your phone has to support it. We are looking at 4 - 5X capacity improvement with the current infrastructure.
That is excluding any Frequency Band refarming and new Band added to LTE.
If you use your phone data service to download torrents all day, then I can possibly see how you'd use your plan data faster, but people don't do that. Maybe you have nothing better to do than watch endless Youtube videos every day until your data is depleted? Then, yes, you would consume all your data faster.
But for everyone else, we will generally use the same amount of data as we do each month. Analogy--the city triples the size of the water main coming into your water meter at your house. Are you going to consume 3x more water because the pipe in the street is bigger?
For video, which is fixed with time and Data. We might likely consumer more video within our time and less picture and text once connection is fast enough for everyone. That will leads to more data being used, but once we factored in higher compression from HEVC, which offer 40% more compression, everything should cancel out.
So yes, the future of unlimited usage is much closer then most people thought. *
*Unless there is another killer app which uses lots of bandwidth.
Personally, I hope that Verizon wins this battle. Verizon doesn't have much going on in terms of being a cable/broadband provider. So they will want to get people to use their 5G service to replace their Internet and cable service: the ultimate cord-cutting package. Meanwhile AT&T - who is part of 3GPP - and others are probably going to want to continue to sell you mobile, broadband and cable separately. (T-Mobile is a wildcard however as they are already working on their T-Mobile TV service.)
If that how it plays out, I hope that Apple sides with Verizon. As the Internet companies are also content owners i.e. Comcast this would be a way of attacking that monopoly. Particularly since Apple will want to offer live TV and their own original content. Being able to deliver that directly to consumers who own iPhones, iPads, Macs, Apple TVs etc. over 5G would be in their benefit.
Your Toyota breaks down? Why don’t you get a Lamborghini?