U Mobile partners ZTE to develop 5G networks here

PETALING JAYA: U Mobile Sdn Bhd has sealed a partnership with ZTE Corporation to drive the development of pre-5G and future implementation of 5G mobile network technologies locally.
Under the latest collaboration, U Mobile is the first telco in Malaysia to enter into the phase of 5G network development.
In a statement yesterday, U Mobile said the partnership signifies its ambition of staying at the forefront of next generation mobile technology and providing seamless and fastest internet connectivity to Malaysia consumers.
"U Mobile is constantly exploring new technology that will provide best in class users experience to our customers. We see 5G technology as the technology that would support the ever increasing communication needs of the future," it said.
"The collaboration with ZTE will also support our government's vision of being a Smart Digital Nation by 2020," U Mobile chief technology officer Too Tian Jen said during the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) held in in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.
He signed the MoU on behalf of U Mobile while ZTE Malaysia was represented by its managing director Steven Ge.
"ZTE is delighted to work on 5G technologies with U Mobile, the leader in network innovations in Malaysia. ZTE is making major investments in 5G to lead the industry in the research and standardization of this key technology of the future," Ze said.
Best known as the data-centric telco, 70% of U Mobile subscribers are smartphone users.
In a statement yesterday U Mobile said a consumer behavioral study in early 2015, the Malaysian public spends an average of 3 hours and 39 minutes browsing the Internet for work, information, browsing and entertainment, which is ranked the highest in the South East Asia region.
Pre-5G is an intermediate level between 4G and 5G. The technology has the potential to offer speeds up to 10 times faster as compared to a 4G LTE network. It will be available earlier than 5G and is able to deliver a near 5G user experience.
While undertaking the research on pre-5G stages, U Mobile is also seeking to develop 5G core technologies that are still currently at an early standardisation stage.
Widely known to be the next generation of mobile network technology, 5Gvision will support the capability of peaking download speeds at up to 20Gbps, which is 20 times faster than LTE-Advanced of 1Gbps.
It allows users to download a High-Definition (HD) movie in seconds as compared to minutes needed on a 4G LTE network.
When it comes to data capacity, 5G is able to offer up to 1,000 times more capacity compared to 4G.
Packed with Gigabyte-sizespeed, high capacity and an ultra-low latency at 1 millisecond, the capabilities of 5G will be another gigantic wave to shake up the current telecommunication industry while shifting consumer behaviour and expectation on the demand of data allowances.