Samsung will provide 5G NR solutions to Sprint for its commercial 5G rollout

Highlights:

• Samsung and Sprint partner to offer commercial 5G solutions in the US.
• Samsung will provide its 5G NR solutions to Sprint.
• The first 5G city of Sprint networks will be Chicago where the service is slated to go live in May

Samsung doesn't only make smartphones with 5G modems, it is also a supplier of 5G infrastructure to networks. At MWC 2019, Samsung announced that US network Sprint is using Samsung’s 5G New Radio (NR) solutions for delivering its 5G network in the United States.

The Samsung 5G NR uses Samsung’s software, as well as a channel card to tap into Samsung’s existing Massive MIMO tech, which Samsung already uses to provide enhanced LTE services in the US. Sprint already uses Samsung’s Massive MIMO to provide 2.5GHz TDD network since 2018. The setup allows both 4G and 5G services to operate commercially using the ‘split mode’ capabilities of Samsung’s MIMO solution. Samsung claims this offers a simple, cost-effective transition to 5G and is capable of achieving 1.5Gbps of throughput.

The first instance of Samsung’s 5G NR solution will be used to offer 5G network in Sprint’s first 5G city, Chicago. The service is scheduled to launch commercially in May.

The 5G service will rely on Sprint’s 2.5GHz spectrum and will offer “hyper-streaming” and “ultra-fast downloading” on 5G-enabled devices. Sprint is showcasing the commercial 2.5GHz 64T64R Massive MIMO unit at Samsung Networks booth at MWC 2019.

You can follow our MWC 2019 coverage here. 

Disclosure: Samsung paid for a Digit correspondent’s travel and stay to MWC 2019, Barcelona.

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