LTE may be not that far, T-Mobile tested LTE

In his recent blog Zahid wrote that LTE is still far away. Well I had the similar feeling as I read the similar article saying that LTE is still far away.

But just when you thought Long Term Evolution (LTE) technology was a dream of the future, T-Mobile comes along and yanks it into the present.

T-Mobile claimed that it has become the first carrier to successfully test LTE technology in a real-world environment in a test it conducted in Germany in conjunction with Nortel. The two companies were able to transmit data from one moving car to another on opposite sides of the Rhine River, without loss of quality or data, even across different cells.

T-Mobile claims it is the first wireless network operator to demonstrate the 4G technology using LTE. T-Mobile in partnership with Nortel tested LTE under real world conditions and were able to transmit data to and from vehicle driving in Bonn between Deutsche telecoms headquarters on the left side of the river Rhine and T-Mobile headquarters on the river’s right bank.

As mentioned by Raju Shanbhag in his blog the above data transmission test by T-Mobile went smoothly without interruptions and without loss of quality even across different cells on the four kilometre test track area.

This test of LTE data transmission across the cell is quite significant when considering the fact that the mobility is the basis of the mobile communication.

Although in some articles one do get the feeling that LTE might still be far away but the above development certainly tells the different story.

The world’s largest mobile operator in terms of subscribers, China Mobile, is defnitely seems to be keeping an eye on these developments and hence it is eager to begin testing 4G TD-LTE soon, a time division duplex (TDD) version of LTE that will be backward compatible with the struggling Chinese 3G standard TD-SCDMA.

Mobile industry is certainly pushing the LTE and trying to ensure that LTE should not be delayed. The news of successful LTE test conducted by T-Mobile is one step further in this direction.

According to a new study from ABI Research there will be more than 32 million LTE customers by 2013. Around a third of these will be in Asia-Pacific with the remainder split about 60-40 per cent between Western Europe and North America. It would appear that the mobile industry is once again doing what it does best, overhyping new technology whilst it is still in development. Announcements about LTE arrive almost daily, each more positive than the next. U.S. CDMA operator Verizon Wireless announces its intention to migrate its network to LTE, Nortel and Motorola announce plans to focus on LTE, perhaps at the expense of WiMAX and so it goes on. Only time will tell whether the hype is justified or if the mobile industry is about to get another dash of cold reality.