After powering the first 5G connection in Europe back in 2017, Huawei’s innovative technology has recently helped Deutsche Telekom expand its mobile 5G telecommunication network in Germany. The leading global provider of information and communications technology continues to support Telekom by upgrading its antennas from 4G to 5G across the country, at a speedy rate. Huawei has also signed a new contract with Telekom to fuel the further upgrade of the network, as one of the two sole suppliers for the expansion.

Telekom now has 12,000 antennas for 5 G in live operation in Germany – the largest 5G network in Germany. Half of the country’s population is expected to benefit from 5G services by mid-July. Thanks to technology and components from Huawei and Ericsson, Telekom Germany now supplies more than 1,000 towns and communities completely or partly with the new mobile communications standard. This covers 16 million German residents, and coverage should go up to 40 million people by mid-July.

"This is the largest 5G initiative in Germany. We are bringing 5G to urban and rural areas for half of the German population. And we are now reaching this milestone earlier than planned," emphasizes Telekom Deutschland CEO Dirk Wössner. He added: “Despite the Corona crisis, we have expanded 5G without detours. Our networks have worked reliably. In addition to the current situation, our technicians have made over 12,000 antennas fit for 5G. By the end of the year, there will even be 40,000 antennas fit for 5G. That is a huge achievement. Deutsche Telekom will also have the best network for 5G. In a first step, around 16 million people in Germany will be able to use 5G from today. By mid-July, half the population of Germany will be able to use it." Customers will not only be offered the best network, but also the right tariffs and attractive smartphones, Wössner said. Among the smartphones on offer is also Huawei’s P40 Pro. for the new 2.1 GHz frequencies.

To support the recent speedy roll-out of the 5G in Germany, Deutsche Telekom made variable use of mobile phone frequencies and implemented new, innovative technologies. The company uses 15 megahertz (MHz) in the 2.1 gigahertz band for LTE and 5G. Of this, 5 MHz come from the previous 3G spectrum and will be rededicated. In addition, Deutsche Telekom acquired 10 MHz of the current 3G spectrum from another provider ahead of schedule.

With this combination of available frequencies, Deutsche Telekom is significantly accelerating the roll-out of 5G - especially in rural areas, as well as improving speeds for its LTE service.

Dynamic Spectrum Sharing (DSS) provides an additional spectrum for LTE customers and allows Deutsche Telekom to operate two mobile communications standards in parallel in one frequency band. The new technology distributes the spectrum between LTE and 5G users according to demand. This way, the network automatically adapts to the needs of the respective customers within milliseconds, hence an even better user experience.

In Telekom’s Radio Access Network (RAN), which consists of the radio masts and the associated transmitting and receiving equipment, and where no data processing takes place, main components from Ericsson and Huawei are installed. As it is technically impossible to upgrade 5G from one manufacturer to 4G components from another manufacturer, Deutsche Telekom will continue to use the existing suppliers Huawei and Ericsson to upgrade this antenna network from 4G to 5G.
Back in 2017, Huawei powered Telekom’s first 5G connection and the first of its kind in Europe. Powered by Huawei user equipment using 3GPP specifications for 5G New Radio (NR), the deployment on commercial sites was the first in Europe and marked an important advancement in the global development of 5G.

The same year, Huawei also partnered with Telekom to launch the fastest 3.5 GHz LTE TDD Massive MIMO field trial with 20MHz bandwidth at 3.5GHz band reaching 750Mbps, a key technology for achieving greater efficiency gains in higher frequency ranges associated with 5G New Radio.

"3.5GHz is a major spectrum asset of Deutsche Telekom", said Wang Yang, Vice President of Huawei TDD product line. " This joint technical innovation is another big milestone in terms of long-term strategic cooperation between both parties. Huawei is quite happy to cooperate with Deutsche Telekom to unleash its great potential in 4G as well as 5G. Massive MIMO is an ideal companion for the 3.5GHz band in terms of both capacity and coverage. We believe this joint innovation will bring technology advance as well as business success to Deutsche Telekom,” said Yang.

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