Deutsche Telekom has claimed a new European record for throughput on the 3.5GHz band, hitting speeds of 750MBps on its commercial mobile network.
The operator partnered with Huawei and Sony for the demonstration, which involved modified commercial Xperia handsets. It combined Massive MIMO, 256QAM and 20MHz of 3.5GHz TDD spectrum.
The trial took place at a former Deutsche Telekom telephone exchange in Berlin Schöneberg.
The operator said the demonstration showed Massive MIMO’s strengths in delivering higher network capacities. It said the technology substantially improved spectrum efficiency and when combined with TDD spectrum can deliver high performances in densely populated areas such as business centres, stadiums, squares, and train stations. 3D-beamforming can be used to deliver high quality networks to high-rise buildings, the operator added.
Martin Bouchard, responsible for network strategy, technical planning and rollout at Deutsche Telekom in Germany, said: “Massive MIMO is an established LTE technology to achieve superb spectrum efficiency improvements. It will also be a key technology for achieving greater efficiency gains in higher frequency ranges associated with 5G New Radio.”
According to Wang Yang, Vice President of Huawei TDD product line, Massive MIMO is “an ideal companion for 3.5GHz band in terms of both capacity and coverage”.