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Vodafone has successfully trialled its 4G technology specifically aimed at enhancing 4G indoor coverage within buildings such as shopping malls, offices and hotels.
The trial took place in Huawei’s UK headquarters with its own employees and visitors testing the system. The trial provided 4G indoor download speeds of up to 82Mbps and 42Mbps for uploads.
The technology was first seen at Mobile World Congress in 2013 and uses Huawei’s ‘LampSite’ LTE 2.6 GHz small cell units. It has already been deployed by China Unicom across a number of Chinese cities.
Vodafone paid nearly £800 million for two 4G spectrum licences back in 2012, within the 800MHz and 2.6GHz bands. The 2.6 GHz frequency band is ideal suited for inner cities and for high data carrying capacity.
The way 4G indoor coverage works with small cells can be seen in the photo above. Basically the receiving unit on the top of a building will receive 4G signal and forward it, via a hub / booster, onto a number of small cells located throughout the building.
Fergal Kelly, CTO of Vodafone UK, stated: “I am delighted to see 2.6Ghz in action on small cell and the impressive data speeds it offers. I’m also impressed with the rapid response from Huawei to this innovation challenge from Vodafone. One year to the day from initial discussion to live product is fantastic and such pace of innovation will be invaluable to Vodafone as we continue to build out the UK’s strongest network.”
"We are totally aligned with our customer's enterprise market needs," said Dr. Zhou Yuefeng, president of Huawei's small cell and Wi-Fi product line. "This solution is a result of our key joint innovations with Vodafone and is designed with the technology and business requirements of our valued customers in mind."
Vodafone has so far launched 4G in 233 large towns and cities across the UK, and with industry experts confirming that around 90% of mobile data is generated indoors we are sure Vodafone will be pushing ahead with this as fast as humanly possible.
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