When Qualcomm announced the world's first 10 gigabit 5G modem Snapdragon X65 in February this year, it claimed that it was designed to support the fastest 5G data speeds.
As if keeping up its words, Qualcomm has now claimed that it has achieved the highest uplink peak rate ever recorded on a commercial network during a live demo in Queensland, Australia.
The demo, in partnership with telecom equipment major Ericsson and Australian mobile operator Telstra, is said to have reached an uplink data speed of close to 1Gbps.
The test, on Telstra's network, was reportedly done on Ericsson’s New Radio-Dual Connectivity (NR-DC) and on a smartphone form-factor test device powered by the aforementioned Snapdragon X65 5G Modem-RF System.
Uplink rates close to 1Gbps can allow any telecom network to more than double the throughput on its 5G network. It is particularly important for supporting applications and services that involve uploading vast amounts of data.
Can offer improved digital experience for users
The testing was conducted at Telstra’s 5G Innovation Centre (5GIC) on its commercial network. The high uplink peak rate was reached by combining the data rates from both mid-band and high band (millimeter wave) to fully utilize Telstra’s spectrum. The demo used Ericsson’s NR-DC software, which is now available for commercial deployment.
Snapdragon X65 came in handy in enhancing coverage, range and power efficiency.
Sibel Tombaz, Head of Product Line 5G RAN, Ericsson, was quoted as saying: “An uplink speed of close to 1Gbps using NR-DC and four-component carrier aggregation is the latest in a series of 5G milestones we have achieved in collaboration with Telstra and Qualcomm Technologies. This means users can enjoy vastly improved experiences from applications where quicker upload time makes a difference.”
Sunil Patil, Vice President, 5G Product Management, Qualcomm Technologies, said: “We’re underscoring our commitment to enabling differentiated 5G experiences across a variety of use cases beyond mobile. Together, we are realizing the full potential of 5G through new breakthroughs that will drive transformative benefits for consumers and enterprises alike.”
For the record, Nokia recently achieved a 'transmission rate' of 110Gbps. But that was demonstrated on on a private 5G network, which offer dedicated connectivity with no resources shared by any third party.
There is also a difference between download speeds and upload speeds. The latter is always slower on commercial networks. In India, networks like Airtel and Jio have demonstrated 1 Gbps download speed on their commercial lines.
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