Scaling a major landmark, the Indian telecom operator Bharti Airtel is reported to have recorded a speed of over 1 Gigabit per second during the 5G field trials while using Finnish company Nokia's network gear in the first round of trials in Mumbai.
According to top company sources, the company is running a live 5G trial in Mumbai's Phoenix Mall in Lower Parel. A Nokia spokesperson has meanwhile, confirmed the development.
Airtel is conducting the trial in the 3500 MHz band using 5G gear from Nokia as per DoT guidelines. The trials have delivered speeds of over 1 Gbps with ultra-low latency. 1 Gbps is 1,000 Mbps (Megabits per second).
The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) recently allotted a 5G trial spectrum to Airtel in 3500 MHz, 28 GHz and 700 MHz in Delhi-NCR, Mumbai, Kolkata and Bengaluru to develop India-relevant use cases on the next-generation fast wireless broadband technology.
Earlier this year, Airtel became the first telecom operator to test 5G over a live network in Hyderabad using liberalised spectrum in an 1800 MHz band. Airtel and Nokia plan to soon begin 5G trials in Kolkata also. Bharti Airtel has received permission for running trials in Delhi and Bengaluru as well.
