EE will launch commercial 5G in six cities across on 30th May 2019: London, Birmingham, Cardiff, Manchester, Edinburgh and Belfast.
EE says users should experience an increase in speeds of around 100-150Mbps even in the busiest areas. Some customers will break the one gigabit-per-second milestone on their 5G smartphones. The fastest speed possible when EE launched 4G in 2012 was just 50Mbps.
From today, EE customers can pre-order a 5G smartphone on EE’s new 5G Smart Plans. Plans start from 10GB (£54 per month) and extend up to 120GB (£74 per month). EE is also rolling out the UK’s first 5G SIM only plans, offering Swappable benefits, inclusive Service Pack benefits, and a range of great 5G data allowances starting at 20GB per month (£32 per month) and rising to 100GB (£52 per month). EE will offer a 5GEE WiFi plan with the HTC 5G Hub at an upfront cost of £100 and with 50GB of data per month for £50 per month, or for £75 per month with 100GB of data per month.
EE is offering several 5G smartphones including Samsung (Galaxy S10 5G) as well as UK exclusives with Oppo (Reno 5G), LG (V50 ThinQ) and One Plus (7 Pro 5G).
In addition to the six launch cities, in 2019 EE will also be introducing 5G across the busiest parts of Bristol, Coventry, Glasgow, Hull, Leeds, Leicester, Liverpool, Newcastle, Nottingham and Sheffield. And in 2020, even more towns and cities will get 5G sites including: Aberdeen, Cambridge, Derby, Gloucester, Peterborough, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Southampton, Worcester and Wolverhampton.
EE is also preparing to launch a 5GEE WiFi and 5GEE home broadband service month. Pricing has not been disclosed but the company says it will be beat fibre broadband.
Marc Allera, CEO of BT’s Consumer division, said: “This is the start of the UK’s 5G journey and great news for our customers that want and need the best connections. We’ve started with 5G in some of the busiest parts of the UK, the widest range of 5G devices in the UK, and plans that give customers the best mobile connection and great benefits.
EE is launching 5G in the busiest parts of the UK, where 5G can really make a difference by providing a more reliable data connection to businesses and consumers. EE is upgrading more than 100 sites to 5G every month whole continuing to expand 4G coverage into rural areas.
EE 5G rollout
- Phase 1: a ‘non-standalone’ deployment focused on using the combined power of 4G and 5G to give customers the fastest, most reliable mobile broadband experience they’ve ever had.
- Phase 2: from 2022, will introduce the full next generation 5G core network, enhanced device chipset capabilities, and increased availability of 5G-ready spectrum. Higher bandwidth and lower latency, coupled with expansive and growing 5G coverage, will enable a more responsive network, enabling truly immersive mobile augmented reality, real-time health monitoring, and mobile cloud gaming. Phase 2 is also a vital step on the journey to the convergence of network technologies.
- Phase 3: from 2023, will introduce Ultra-Reliable Low Latency Communications (URLLC), Network Slicing and multi-gigabit-per-second speeds. This phase of 5G will enable critical applications like real-time traffic management of fleets of autonomous vehicles, massive sensor networks with millions of devices measuring air quality across the entire country, and the ‘tactile internet’, where a sense of touch can be added to remote real-time interactions.
http://www.ee.co.uk/5G
Marc Allera, CEO of BT’s Consumer division, said: “This is the start of the UK’s 5G journey and great news for our customers that want and need the best connections. We’ve started with 5G in some of the busiest parts of the UK, the widest range of 5G devices in the UK, and plans that give customers the best mobile connection and great benefits.
Speaking at the Huawei UK Partner Summit 2019 in London, Dr. Liang Hua, Chairman of Huawei Board, said his company is increasing its investments in the nation, including opening a new training centre in Birmingham to train engineers on the use of 5G technology and solutions. The centre will have the capacity to train more than 500 engineers a year and is due to open in June.
“The market for ICT modernization has seen considerable growth in the past few years as more companies look for adaptive, flexible solutions to meet their needs, which is why we’re very excited about working alongside industry veterans like Cherry & White,” said Christian Erbe, VP Sales EMEA at ECI. “Critical infrastructure is an important market for ECI, and with more than 50 years of experience servicing hundreds of customers around the world, this partnership is an opportunity for both our companies to help others make the transition. This is yet another indication of our considerable positive momentum, particularly in the United Kingdom, and we’re looking forward to a bright future ahead.”
“Omnitek’s technology is a great complement to our FPGA business. Their deep, system-level FPGA expertise and high-performance video and vision-related technology have made them a trusted partner for many of our most important customers. Together, we will deliver leading FPGA solutions for video, vision and AI inferencing applications on Intel FPGAs and speed time-to-market for our existing customers while winning new ones,” Dan McNamara, Intel senior vice president and general manager of the Programmable Solutions Group.
ADVA confirmed that its FSP 3000 is playing a key role in the new UKQNtel transport network secured by quantum key distribution (QKD). As part of an initiative led by QComm Hub, and with partners BT, ID Quantique and the universities of Cambridge and York, ADVA has constructed a QKD link capable of carrying classical and quantum channels on the same standard, installed fiber.
Paul Ceely, Director of Network Strategy, BT Group, said: “While the concessions model made sense in the early 2010’s when it first came into common use, the market and regulatory landscape have changed and it’s become clear that exclusivity agreements act as a barrier to further 4G and 5G investments. Government initiatives such as the DCMS Barrier Busting taskforce are showing the way, but we believe that industry needs to act. We are leading the way by handing back exclusivity in nine key areas.
Isotropic Systems, which is based in London, is developing the world's first multi-service, high-bandwidth, low power, fully integrated high throughput terminal designed to support the satellite industry to 'reach beyond' traditional markets and acquire new customers with a full suite of high throughput services.
Equinix said it remains confident in the future of London as Europe's major financial hub and one of the world's greatest commercial cities, regardless of the outcome of the ongoing negotiations around the UK's departure from the European Union. The new $120M (£90M GBP) data center forms part of a total $387M (£295M GBP) investment in the UK's digital economy from Equinix throughout 2018/19.
Telefónica UK won all 40 MHz of 2.3 GHz spectrum available, at a cost of £205,896,000; and 40 MHz of 3.4 GHz spectrum at a cost of £317,720,000.
CityFibre was acquired in June 2018 by Antin Infrastructure Partners and West Street Infrastructure Partners, a fund managed by Goldman Sachs.
The new campus will be known as “UK London 1 Data Center” (London 1) and is capable of up to 24,000 sqm IT space and 60MW IT load once fully developed. The project also involves Gyron, the NTT Com owned UK operator which is currently being integrated with e-shelter to create a combined pan-European operating platform. Construction will begin next month. Phase one, with an initial 8MW IT load, is targeted to be ready for December 2019, with five further phases planned to follow.
Under the agreement with Three UK and O2, approximately 100 points of connectivity exit from this central London sewer network via two BT Exchanges. By partnering with SSE Enterprise Telecoms, Three UK and O2 can operate their own Central London Area (CLA) network, while also accessing spare fibre ducts for future initiatives in London.
