T-Mobile is taking its cutting-edge 5G Advanced service nationwide
Ulf Ewaldsson, president of technology at T-Mobile, said at a panel on Monday that T-Mobile is about to take its 5G Advanced technology nationwide. Ewaldsson said, "We've gone from number four in our nation to become the leader with our network."The executive gave credit for T-Mobile's network leadership and increased speed and coverage to the $26 billion acquisition of Sprint in 2020.
When T-Mobile first employed its SA 5G network, it used it only for its low-band spectrum. At the time, it improved its 5G coverage by 30%. Ewaldsson said that now T-Mobile is taking SA 5G to the entire network.
5G Advanced uses cutting-edge technology to deliver faster data speeds, lower latency, and larger network capacity. Some of the advanced features are possible thanks to T-Mobile's standalone (SA) 5G network. This network has a 5G core and was never used to disseminate 4G signals. SA 5G networks offer certain technologies unique to these networks. For example, an SA 5G network can be used for network slicing. That's when a carrier creates customized slices of its 5G network for different customers. Each slice has different characteristics demanded by each subscriber.
Another important technology that is part of the 5G Advanced experience is Carrier Aggregation. This technology can be explained by imagining a sleepy two-lane road that becomes a six-lane super highway. There is more room for traffic allowing vehicles to move faster and capacity expands. This is how Carrier Aggregation works. Multiple frequency bands are combined increasing the bandwidth resulting in increases in data speeds. Here's a more compelling image. Imagine a pipe that is made wider allowing more data through. That's another way to look at Carrier Aggregation.
Comparing a standalone 5G network with a non-standalone 5G network. | Image credit-T-Mobile
By taking all of the cutting-edge technology that is part of 5G Advanced and moving it nationwide, T-Mobile expects to provide improved capacity and coverage from the same network. All of this led Avi Greengart, analyst and president of Techsponential, to say after Ewaldsson's speech, "It might make the network more efficient. It certainly makes it more buzzwordy." Based on T-Mobile's preference to focus on investors rather than consumers, I'd say that the latter is more important to it.
Speaking of buzzwords, T-Mobile plans on injecting AI into its network. Ewaldsson said, "The network is holding up better than it's ever done. We have halved the downtime per subscriber by using AI technology."
As well as T-Mobile has scored on speed tests and on other tests that measure its service versus rivals, it appears that the carrier has a game plan to continue improving the quality, speed, and capacity of its 5G network in the U.S. all of which should make its competitors feel a little nervous and turn a light shade of magenta.
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