27Gb/s achieved in

Japanese 5G mobile trial

TECHNOLOGY

Japan’s NTT DoCoMo and Mitsubishi Electric have undertaken joint outdoor field trials of massive-element antenna systems technology. The field trial, which took place in Kamakura, harnessed an antenna system with 16-beam spatial-multiplexing technology and 500MHz of bandwidth (16 x 16 MIMO). Base-station antennas on the wall of a building directed beams to mobile-terminal antennas mounted on top of a vehicle.

The test setup delivered maximum throughput speeds of 27Gb/s over a communication distance of 10m and 25Gbps over 100m over a single mobile terminal in the 28GHz band. A top-end conventional 4G network using 60MHz of bandwidth (4 x 4 MIMO) achieved 988Mbps over a similar distance.

This ‘world first’ implies higher potential speeds for 5G. Minimum ITU requirements for 5G performance specifies peak downlink speed of 20Gbps and an uplink of 10Gbps, depending upon available spectrum and environment. In order to roll out this setup in, a huge amount of fibre optic cable and a dense urban network are required.

Statement from Mitsubishi and NTT DOCOMO

The trials achieved the world's first successful wireless downlink transmissions at data rates of 27Gbps and 25Gbps when the distance between the base station and the mobile terminal was 10m and 100m, respectively. The achieved peak data rates correspond to spectral efficiency of 67bps/Hz5, believed to be the world's best performance for 28GHz-band mobile telecommunication.

The test achieved the goal of the Japanese government's research and development project to help realise 5G mobile communications based on high data-rate and low-power-consumption radio-access technologies and using an ultra-high-frequency band and extra-wide-bandwidth massive MIMO. The developed technologies are expected to enable wireless communications at ultra-high data rates of more than 20Gbps to moving vehicles with numerous passengers, such as buses.

The test setup delivered maximum throughput speeds of 27Gb/s over a communication distance of 10m and 25Gbps over 100m over a single mobile terminal in the 28GHz band. A top-end conventional 4G network using 60MHz of bandwidth (4 x 4 MIMO) achieved 988Mbps over a similar distance.

This ‘world first’ implies higher potential speeds for 5G. Minimum ITU requirements for 5G performance specifies peak downlink speed of 20Gbps and an uplink of 10Gbps, depending upon available spectrum and environment. In order to roll out this setup in, a huge amount of fibre optic cable and a dense urban network are required.