NTT DoCoMo announced that it will commence delivery of 5G trial environments in Japan possibly as early as May 2017, working in conjunction with various partners in industries such as automobiles, railways and broadcasting.
DoCoMo said the 5G trial sites, which will enable customers to experience services and content leveraging 5G technology, will be the latest step toward a commercial 5G system that DoCoMo expects to launch in 2020.
The initial 5G trial sites will be offered mainly in two districts of Tokyo, the Odaiba waterfront and Tokyo Skytree Town. The sites will leverage the 5G radio network expertise of Ericsson and the 5G client leadership of Intel, the world’s largest semiconductor manufacturer.
DoCoMo plans to utilize the 28-GHz frequency band, one of the candidate bands that the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications is considering to designate for commercial 5G networks in Japan.
DoCoMo expects to expand the scope of the trials later by collaborating with other network engineering firms and chip vendors, and also by utilizing the additional 4.5-GHz candidate band.
DoCoMo will provide an overview of the 5G trial sites during DoCoMo R&D Open House 2016, which will take place at the DoCoMo R&D Center in the Yokosuka Research Park near Yokohama on November 17 and 18.
Going forward, DoCoMo will continue to create new services through R&D collaboration with partner companies and blue-chip vendors in support of its planned launch of a commercial 5G mobile network by 2020.
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