India’s First 5G Video Call Demoed By Ericsson, Qualcomm At IMC

As India is still awaiting 5G, Swedish telecom company Ericsson and American telecom equipment maker Qualcomm, on Tuesday, collaborated to demonstrate the first 5G video call in the country on millimetreWave (mmWave) spectrum at the ongoing India Mobile Congress (IMC) in Delhi.

The companies also demonstrated India’s first 4K video streaming and cloud-based gaming using sub-6 GHz and mmWave using 5G commercial devices

mmWave is a 5G network that ranges from 28 GHz to 39 GHz spectrum. The network is currently being used in North America, and advanced countries such as Japan and Korea are awaiting its launch.

“5G will form the backbone of emerging technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT) and machine to machine communications and will provide India with ‘smart infrastructure’ that will open up new opportunities for the country,” Ericsson South East Asia’s head Nunzio Mirtillo said.

As a part of the demonstration, Ericsson’s Nunzio Mirtillo made a video call to Qualcomm India vice president Rajen Vagadia. The two companies have been working together to develop technology to push 5G networks around the globe.

The demonstration was completed using a Qualcomm’s smartphone based on Snapdragon 855 mobile platform and Ericsson’s 5G platform. The Snapdragon 855 Mobile Platform was also equipped with Snapdragon X50 5G Modem-RF System, whereas the Ericsson’s 5G platform included 5G NR radio, RAN Compute products and 5G Evolved Packet Core.

Mirtillo added, “Over the past few years we have been working with several stakeholders to build the 5G ecosystem in the country. Today marks an important step in India’s journey towards 5G.”

Reliance Jio, Samsung Collaborate For 5G Push In India

Reliance Jio and South Korea’s Samsunghave also partnered to push for the development of 5G network in India. At IMC, the two companies showcased real-world uses cases that can be leveraged by 5G networks. The two companies also demonstrated 5G-based solutions including Samsung Network’s 5G product lineup, including its 3.5GHz solution for 5G Massive MIMO Unit (MMU), its 28GHz Access Unit (AU) and CPE device, its virtualized radio access (vRAN) and core, and 5G mobile devices.

Reliance Jio and Samsung also emphasised on the advantages of 5G in creating virtual classrooms, 360-content and public safety network.