SK Telecom has demonstrated a 600 Mbps data transmission rate by using Nokia Networks’ 4X4 Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) technology.
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To achieve the 600 Mbps data transmission rate, SK Telecom, a leading 4G operator in Korea, first realized 300 Mbps data rates by applying 4X4 MIMO technology to a contiguous 20 MHz block of spectrum. Later, the telecoms combined two of these wideband LTE bandwidths using Carrier Aggregation (CA) technology to achieve 600 Mbps LTE-Advanced (LTE-A) data speeds.
The data speed of 600 Mbps is eight times faster than the speed of the original LTE network with 10 MHz bandwidth and four times faster than the speed of the LTE-A network realized by combining two 10MHz component carriers via CA. It is two times faster than tri-band LTE-A (20 MHz + 10 MHz + 10 MHz CA), which currently provides the highest speed in Korea.
Since a mobile device with four antennas and CA capability has not been developed yet, the two companies used a mobile device simulator made by Aeroflex, a test and measurement instrumentation vendor, to measure the data speeds during the demo.
Park Jin-hyo, senior vice president and ead of Network Technology R&D Center at SK Telecom said: “This demonstration of 4X4 MIMO technology strengthens our competitiveness in LTE-A.”
