Ericsson has extended its 5G collaboration with Korean operator KT to cover the Internet of Things, after holding a distributed MIMO demonstration.
The two companies had been working together on carrier aggregation within hetnets since signing a partnership agreement last year. KT is aiming to demonstrate the world’s first 5G services at the PyeongChang 2018 Olympics.
During a recent demonstration, both companies set up 5G mobile device equipment with distributed MIMO on a moving vehicle. Ericsson said the multipoint connectivity allows operators to connect to a large number of small cells without interruption and eliminate outage spots.
The technology potentially could be used to beam gigabit level wireless services such as hologram video into moving vehicles, The Swedish vendor added.
Ericsson CEO Hans Vestberg said: “We will take the lead in developing 5G technologies in collaboration with KT, a leading mobile telecommunications service provider in South Korea. We will actively cooperate with KT to achieve 5G international standardisation and the successful evolution toward 5G communications.”
The demonstration comes after a number of test networks rolled out by Ericsson both indoor and outdoor, in the United States and its native Sweden.
KT said it would work with Ericsson on developing new indoor and outdoor test beds in Korea. They will explore 5G mobile broadband access technologies, ultra-dense networks and 5G core technologies and systems.
Chang-gyu Hwang, KT CEO, commented: “Our cooperation with Ericsson will strengthen our strategy to lead 5G and provide seamless connectivity to our consumers.”