Telkom plans 200Mbps network

Bryanston, Camps Bay, Balito and Garsfontein are four of the over 50 suburbs across SA that Telkom will cover with LTE-Advanced in its initial rollout.

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Telkom will begin the rollout of true 4G - or long-term evolution (LTE)-Advanced (LTE-A) - by the end of this year.

The company said this morning it planned to cover more than 50 suburbs across SA with LTE-A, which is considered to be the next evolution of high-speed wireless connectivity, starting from December and into the first quarter of next year.

This comes a week after Vodacom announced it had successfully trialled LTE-A on its network, using temporary spectrum in the 2.6GHz band, following the completion of a six-year base station replacement project. The operator says, once government allocates the requisite spectrum, its national network will be able to offer true 4G.

While LTE technology launched in SA in October 2012, 4G has not been more than a marketing term operators have used when referring to fourth-generation mobile technology. Technically, 4G is LTE-Advanced - defined by the International Telecommunication Union as being capable of download speeds of 100Mbps and up.

Telkom notes LTE-A can potentially offer speeds of up to 3Gbps. The company is in the process of upgrading its network to offer customers peak speeds of over 200Mbps, it says. "[This,] with a view to developing the network to ultimately deliver LTE-A peak speeds of 3Gbps."

Telkom COO Brian Armstrong says Telkom believes LTE-A will become the de facto mobile data standard in the coming years. "Our LTE-A platform runs on the 2.3GHz spectrum, which is unique to Telkom. The speeds offered on this technology are comparable to those offered over fibre connections."

Armstrong says the company aims to have the first areas connected during the course of December, and expects the initial rollout to be complete by March 2015.

While the exact LTE-A product offerings and prices are still to be announced, Telkom says it will offer "bigger bundles and greater speeds" with the new technology.

The company says the initial LTE-A rollout will enable peak connectivity speeds of over 200Mbps to selected suburbs identified in Gauteng, KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape.