Australian mobile network operator (MNO) Optus has announced the switch-on a ‘new live 5G site’ in the Kellyville suburb of Sydney. In a press release regarding the development the MNO noted that the site is one of 50 that is to be constructed by Swedish vendor Ericsson across Sydney and Melbourne over the coming months, as part of Optus’ multi-vendor 5G rollout. Using Ericsson’s 5G RAN equipment, the Kellyville site achieved ‘a working end to end solution based on 3GPP standards, utilising third-party customer premises equipment (CPE) test device on Optus’ 3.5GHz spectrum with a channel bandwidth of 60MHz’.
Optus’ Kellyville announcement follows on from last month’s press release confirming that three 5G sites had gone live, two in suburbs of Canberra and one in Sydney; Finland’s Nokia supplied the 5G RAN and Fastmile CPEs for those sites. Moreover, at that date Optus revealed that it aims to have switched on 1,200 5G sites across the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia by March 2020.
Alongside the network rollout plans, Optus last month also revealed its ‘5G Home Broadband’ plan, which will cost AUD70 (USD50 per month), include unlimited data, and provide a 50Mbps download speed ‘satisfaction guarantee’. Initially, the MNO is allowing customers to register their interest for a chance to be among the first phase of users in selected suburbs, though it noted that ‘initial 5G coverage will be for limited areas within the suburb’ and added that it will confirm serviceability with would-be subscribers. Initial services are expected to be delivered in Q2 2019.
Commenting on the most recent site switch-on, meanwhile, Dennis Wong, Optus’ Managing Director Networks, said: ‘This is another significant milestone for Optus as we continue with our customer focused 5G roll-out plan … With our fourth live 5G site now live we are building towards a truly game-changing year for Optus and our customers. Our next generation network build is now well and truly in full swing with site roll out planned over the coming months.’