RCS&RDS (DIGI), Romania’s fourth largest cellco by subscribers, has announced the launch of its first 5G commercial service, ‘Digi Mobil 5G Smart’, in the busiest areas of Bucharest. The operator is deploying Ericsson’s 3GPP standards-based 5G New Radio (NR) hardware and software on top of its 4G network to enable customers to connect to both 4G and 5G simultaneously. In the coming weeks, the two companies plan to activate more 5G base stations in the capital as well as another five locations in Romania, namely Constanta, Mamaia, Oradea, Cluj-Napoca and Iasi, before extending the service to Sinaia, Busteni, Predeal, Brasov, Poiana Brasov, Timi oara, Craiova and Sibiu in September. The announcement comes a day after Vodafone launched the first commercial 5G service in Romania.
Customers can now pre-order 5G-compatible handsets on the operator’s website. ‘As usual, our promise is that we will serve our customers with reliable and affordable mobile data services, including 5G, in selected areas in Bucharest and other big cities of Romania already in 2019,’ notes Digi’s Vice President Valentin Popoviciu.
Although Romania plans to begin the auction for additional spectrum needed for 5G wireless networks in the fourth quarter of 2019, RCS&RDS is able to offer initial 5G services through its current 3.6GHz-3.8GHz rights.