South Korean operator LG Uplus and Huawei have enabled dual carrier aggregation technology on a commercial network, bringing uplink data rates of 108MBps.
Huawei described the launch as the first of its kind on a commercial network. The companies aggregated 20MHz of spectrum in the 2.6GHz band with another 10MHz uplink carrier in the 850MHz band.
The live rollout followed successful tests on LG Uplus’s network, along with the first smartphones hitting the market that support dual carrier aggregation on the uplink.
Huawei said the technology will help support the growing demand of consumers wanting to upload high definition video and photos.
The vendor said: “The world’s major cellular carriers see uplink data rate as a major bottleneck in improving user experience. In response, they are looking to new and innovative techniques for improving mobile network uplink data rate to meet ever-growing data usage demands, improve user satisfaction, and increase revenues.”
LG Uplus has already rolled out tri-band carrier aggregation across its network, and is currently exploring how 256QAM technology can further improve downlink data rates.
According to the latest figures from the Global mobile Suppliers Association, LG Uplus is in the minority in having launched tri-band CA. Almost a quarter of operators around the world have launched LTE-Advanced, with more than one in three investing in the technology.