MTN South Africa Launches LTE with Ericsson

MTN South Africa has launched its commercial LTE network following more than a year of pilot activity.  The carrier is currently offering an LTE version of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9″ with a 2GB data allowance for R799.00 (US$92) per month with a 12 month contract.  Coverage is initially available in certain areas of Pretoria , Johannesburg and Durban.

Ericsson has supplied its RBS 6000 family of base stations, the Evolved Packet Core, Home Subscriber Server (HSS) for user data management, Operating Support Systems (OSS), project management and services.

Lars Lindén, head of Region Sub-Saharan Africa, Ericsson, said: "This will open countless opportunities and will change the way people work, live and play. The commercial deployment of LTE will help users experience and interact in a better, more efficient way."

Ericsson noted that this marks its first LTE network in Africa.  The company currently has over  90 commercial LTE contracts on six continents, of which over 50 networks have already gone live. More than 455 million people worldwide have LTE coverage, of which 305 million are covered by LTE networks supplied by Ericsson (July 2012).

http://www.ericsson.com/
http://www.mtn.co.za