Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has given its nod for a nationwide role out of 5G mobile network coverage, this is as the country has started to witness awareness for commercial role of 5G in the mobile data and telecommunications space of the country.
According to the Executive Vice Chairman of the Nigerians Communications Commission(NCC) Umar Danbatta Thursday in Lagos, Nigeria will witness Internet of Things socio-economic growth and fast data enterprise services support with 5G network coverage across the country.
Danbatta who shared views during the Lagos trial launch of 5G network at MTN Nigeria head-office noted that 5G is the key to the future that will support significantly faster mobile broadband speeds, which is one of the Nigerian government agenda.
Represented by Henry Ojiokpota, NCC’s Lagos Zonal Coordinator, Danbatta said regulations are in place to ensure that telecommunication broadband internet infrastructure are extended to every nooks and crannies of the country according to the NCC 2003 ACT.
“5G represents the bedrock of future communications and Nigeria cannot afford not to be part of that future. “NCC is excited with what MTN is doing today because they are actually opening up the future,” he added.
Danbatta assured on regulations and implementation policy to ensure that the commercial launch of 5G in the country will support businesses’ innovations, transforming supply chain management and creating smarter, more efficient manufacturing layout.
MTN Nigeria started the trial launch of the 5G Network in Abuja last week. It proceeded to Calabar, South-West Nigeria and now Lagos. NewswatchNigeria can report that the network testing in Abuja was powered by Huawei, while Calabar and Lagos are powered by ZTE and Ericsson respectively.
During a comparison test on both 4G and 5G networks, it took just 15.78 seconds to download a 2.3 GB video on the 5G network. The same file on 4G took exactly 5 minutes, 3.84 seconds.
While download speed on the 5G network was about 1 Gbps, it can apparently go as high as 4.1 Gbps. According to Dolapo Adeniji-Adele, RF Technical Specialist at MTN, factors like server load, as well as the device contribute to the download speed.
On the other hand, the download speed on the 4G network was just about 68.2 Mbps, which is a little fraction compared to that of 5G. Worthy of note is that the 4G network is on the 2600 MHz band and 5G on 26 GHz.
Unlike fibre optic that requires laying cables, 5G infrastructure basically works on cloud-based architecture.
For the trial, MTN secured a 100 MHz spectrum in Calabar and 20 MHz in Abuja. As, expected this resulted in a significant difference between the Internet speed tests in Abuja and Calabar.
In a report for Q1 2018, the MTN Group recorded a 15.2% year-on-year growth.
While 5G has the Internet speed advantage, voice calls are expected to continue to be a key medium of revenue for MTN.
MTN however said it has started working to enable ‘Voice over 5G’, the first of its kind in Africa. In a demo, a voice call over 5G connected in under 2 seconds.
