Credit: Dreamstime
Telstra (ASX:TLS) has completed the installation of more than 50 4G small cells in Melbourne's CBD, as part of plans to install more than 1,000 small cells to enhance capacity in metro areas.
The first small cells are located in the city's criss-cross east to west between Spring Street and Spencer Street, and north to south between La Trobe Street and Flinders Street, the telco revealed.
The miniature versions of standard mobile base stations should be rolled out over three years.
“We have been using small cells to extend coverage mostly in rural and remote areas for several years, now we are deploying them in some of the busiest locations in Australia as a cost effective way to handle the ever growing demand for data,” Telstra executive director for network and infrastructure engineering, Channa Seneviratne, said.
“We have now put small cells at some of Melbourne’s busiest locations – from Southern Cross station, to Degraves St, to Young and Jackson’s Hotel on Flinders St to the front of the Tennis Centre."
Seneviratne said that the busiest small cells are the ones near the intersections of Spencer St and Collins St; Spencer St and Bourke St; and Flinders St and St. Kilda Rd.
"Traffic carried on these cells is between two and three times the average CBD small cell traffic," Seneviratne added.
"Working in concert with our existing 3G and 4G base stations across the city, these small cells will deliver fast internet browsing, video streaming, social media or a mobile office to our customers.
"By mid-year, we will take this one step further with the activation of additional LTE advanced features like coordinated multi-point (CoMP) in the CBD to create a leading edge heterogeneous network (HetNet). This will further boost the efficiency and performance of the network in the CBD.”
Looking ahead, Seneviratne said Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth's CBD will follow.
In February, Telstra detailed its 5G network plans to deliver it by 2018, with the telco giant estimating that the technology could be used by the industry to deliver wireless broadband to more than one million homes and businesses.
Furthermore, Telstra is also planning a 5G mobile service that will be able to support both sub 6GHz and mmWave spectrum.
