China Telecom completes 5G SA data call with Ericsson/MediaTek

China Telecom completed its first 5G Standalone (SA) end-to-end data call on its 5G trial network in Hangzhou using a commercial chipset-based terminal from MediaTek. Ericsson provided 5G commercial base stations, its newly launched Standalone NR software, and a 5G cloud core solution.

Ericsson’s 5G base station comprises Baseband 6630 and AIR 6488, which are deployed in commercial 5G networks across the world and can support both Non-Standalone (NSA) and SA deployment. Ericsson’s 5G Core will also help to accelerate 5G commercialization and enable fresh use cases in new segments.

In addition to supporting enhanced mobile broadband services, 5G SA also enables Ultra Reliable Low Latency Communications (URLLC) use cases such as autonomous driving, smart manufacturing and remote surgery. Standalone 5G also supports a new range of IoT services with technologies such as network slicing and edge computing. 5G SA has been planned as the 5G target deployment architecture by major service providers in the world.

In April 2019, Ericsson and MediaTek performed an interoperability development test in a lab in Ottawa, Canada, resulting in a groundbreaking 5G standalone end-to-end call on the 2.6GHz band based on 3GPP’s 5G December 2018 specifications. The successful field trial this week with China Telecom in Hangzhou was completed using a 3.5GHz spectrum, also based on 3GPP 2018 December specifications.