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February 03, 2014

First LTE CAT6 Carrier Aggregation Interoperability Seen from Ericsson and Qualcomm for Telstra

At the end of January, Ericsson and Qualcomm effectively completed the world’s first inter-vendor interoperability testing of LTE Category 6 (CAT6). The last stages of testing were accomplished in collaboration with Telstra.

Telstra Corporation Limited, known as Telstra, is an Australian telecommunications and media company. It builds and operates telecommunications networks and markets voice, mobile, internet access, pay television and other entertainment products and services.

Telstra’s LTE Advanced network in Australia is being readied for CAT6 commercial launch. LTE CAT6 offers much higher potential data speeds than Category 4, which peaks at 150Mbps. In fact, it doubles the speed, coming in at 300Mbps.

The commercial rollout of Telstra`s LTE Advanced network will be supported by a combination of Ericsson’s L14A software and the Qualcomm Gobi 9x35 chipset. This is Qualcomm’s fourth-generation 3G/LTE multimode modem.

Serge Willenegger, who is vice president, product management at Qualcomm said, "We`re excited to be playing an important role in enabling the world`s first multi-vendor commercial LTE Category 6 solution. This latest collaboration with Ericsson is yet another example of delivering the fastest and most versatile mobile broadband experiences globally."

One thing that simplifies the process is that the equipment used for the tests was based on ready-to-release versions of Ericsson`s L14A software release. This allows for an incomparable user experience on operator networks using multi-frequency deployments.

Ericsson L14A embraces load balancing for better spectrum efficiency and an improved user experience during high-load situations. It supports all bandwidth and frequency combinations for up to 40MHz Carrier Aggregation, providing users with speeds of up to 300Mbps.

Hakan Eriksson, who is CEO, Australia and New Zealand at Ericsson, said, "We are pleased to see 300Mbps achieved and we`re excited about the superior broadband experience this will enable. With the introduction of Category 6, adoption of LTE Advanced is expected to accelerate, with a key factor being the availability of commercial infrastructure and global chipsets for smartphones."

The three main points that came to light concerning the Ericsson announcement are:

  • Ericsson and Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. demonstrate CAT6, 300Mbps interoperability device testing (IODT) for Telstra
  • CAT6 LTE Advanced Carrier Aggregation doubles throughput and improves app coverage
  • The commercial rollout of Telstra's LTE Advanced network will be supported by Ericsson L14A release and Qualcomm Gobi 9x35 chipset



Edited by Cassandra Tucker


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