Smart pioneers ‘5G’ technology in PH

Co-founder and Chief Wireless Advisor of Smart Orlando B. Vea (first from left) during the tests of 5G LTE-A in Smart last year, where speeds reaching 209.66 mbps were recorded. CONTRIBUTED PHOTO/www1.smart.com.ph

MANILA, Philippines—Smart Communications Inc., (Smart) announced Thursday it will now run Long-Term Evolution-Advanced (LTE-A) internet technology, making Smart the first telecommunications company to operate LTE-A in the Philippines.

According to Smart, LTE-A, also dubbed as ‘5G’ by global telecommunications companies, could provide users with data from between 100 megabits per second (mbps) to 1 gigabit per second (Gbps). This rate, according to the telecommunications provider, is “ten times faster than 3G services and more than twice as fast as 4G services.”

Smart founder and Chief Wireless Advisor Orlando B. Vea said that, “Even as our 3G and 4G networks continue to be unrivaled, Smart becomes the first operator to leap into the future and put the Philippines at par with the world’s most advanced countries in terms of mobile communications technology.”

Smart claims that the ‘5G’ technology will enable users to download a 10-MB file in a second, watch Youtube videos without buffering and video-call almost lag-free.

Bringing the ‘5G’ technology to the Philippines make Smart one of the only handful LTE-A providers in the world, along with other mobile providers from United States, South Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore and Australia.

Smart has started testing LTE-A technology in the country since last year and has reported that the results of the tests yielded 100mbps. The tests were done in Makati City, Boracay and Davao City.

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