– It is a product that does not look exactly like – E24

– Now I should officially declare the network open, but I understand that it has already been activated, jokingly says Secretary of State Paul Chaffey of the Ministry of Local Government and Modernization, while cutting the purple thread.

On Monday, he lined up in front of the Storting to mark that Telia’s 5G network is open in Oslo. In May, the company officially launched the 5G network in Lillestrøm and is constantly expanding. Bergen is the next city to come out and the network will open there later this fall.

Telia promises that half of the Norwegian population will have 5G wherever they live in the next year, and in 2023 there will be national coverage. Telenor has also opened its Norwegian 5G network and has vowed to strike hard.

– We leave early with our plans and lead. It is good to note that the 5G network is already open in Oslo, because it is a product that does not seem exactly, says Jon Christian Hillestad, head of Telia Bedrift, about the mobile signals that now flow over the capital.

However, to this day, the use is small. Because there are about 40,000 mobile phones on the Telia network that can use the 5G network, but only about 1,000 mobile phones that actually use it on a daily basis, according to the company itself.

Use 5G for movies

The Secretary of State is not yet one of the 5G users, because he laughs “no” to the question of whether he has a 5G phone. But that doesn’t dampen the enthusiasm that Telia, Telenor, Ice, and others in the industry invest billions in Norwegian infrastructure every year.

– Last year, the industry invested NOK 12 billion in Norwegian telecommunications networks and the most important thing we can do is make sure that a lot of investment continues in the future, says Chaffey.

– What can 5G networks be used for?

– Good question. We know that the Oslo metro will use 5G and the mobile network to control signals and there are many interesting areas of use in things like water and sewage, energy management and the development of smarter cities, says Chaffey and continues:

– We know exciting things will happen, but not exactly what. And that’s a bit of what makes it exciting, because here there are opportunities and innovative people will invent clever things.

One of those that has really used the 5G network is the Qvisten animation studio, which is behind well-known films like Knutsen and Ludvigsen 2, Captain Sabertooth, The Animals in Hakkebakkeskogen, the Flåklypa trilogy and the Knerten films.

– We have used 5G for almost four months at Lillestrøm and have gained speeds of 1,200 to 1,400 megabits per second in downloads and around 80 megabits per second in uploads. We see a latency (response time, journ.anm.) Of 15 to 25 milliseconds when we control machines remotely, which is the same as doing the operation directly on the site, explains Andreas Martin Aanerud in Qvisten.

When the film company is now in the process of producing the film about Kardemommeby, a studio will be built at Dyreparken in Kristiansand.

– An alternative was to excavate the entire zoo to add fiber lines, so we chose 5G as an alternative, he says.

They use the internet so that in Dyreparken you can download the material from the studio in Oslo before quickly recording, and then upload the recordings to Oslo overnight.

“Everyone” awaits Apple

Use of 5G has been relatively low since 5G networks were activated in Norway this year. A lot of testing is still underway, but in the coming months both Telia and the industry expect usage to start picking up.

This happens both from the fact that more and more base stations are upgrading to 5G and from the fact that more and more mobiles and routers will support it.

So far, the company has updated 233 base stations in Oslo, most of which have received 5G and the rest have been updated with the latest 4G technology.

– All of Oslo will have 5G, says Jon Christian Hillestad in Telia.

– In our list of the ten most popular phones, half now support 5G, he goes on and adds that they now also have routers for wireless broadband (fixed wireless in the industry’s language) that support the technology.

Now there is a very key player in the industry:

The session at Eidsvolls plass in Oslo took place the day before Apple started its launch program. There is speculation if the tech giant will unveil a new iPhone with 5G on Tuesday night Norwegian time (read more on E24’s sister website Tek.no).

Mobile phone companies are completely dependent on major manufacturers, such as Apple and Samsung, who launch models with support for the appropriate frequencies and technologies.

It often dictates how quickly mobile customers take advantage of innovations overnight.

When the iPhone at the time launched 4G only on the 1,800 frequency, Telenor decided to launch 4G on the “iPhone frequency”. Over time, however, Apple also supported the other frequencies used on the Norwegian mobile network and the usage skyrocketed.

More people are getting interested

Telia is far from the only one in the 5G race. Telenor has also launched its network and is in full swing with construction. Ice recently announced that they will also come with 5G, initially in Tromsø.

– Have you made many changes to your implementation plans along the way?

– We have established a career that we mostly follow. As we change something, it is often about specific business needs, Hillestad says.

– What do customers get out of this other than more speed? Are the new solutions still a bit outdated?

For the regular user these days it’s mostly about higher speed and low latency (faster response time on the web, journ.anm.), And what customers and app developers can use it for. Additionally, wireless broadband solutions benefit from this, says Hillestad and continues:

– In the corporate market, we are now in concrete conversations with various clients, including hospitals that want to use 5G for internal communication. It hasn’t been long since 5G was discussed as an abstract thing to come, but now it’s here.

Although most of the 5G and fiber development takes place commercially in Norway, the state also contributes money to provide broadband to the missing areas.

In the state budget for 2021, it is proposed to spend 264 million on broadband support in the districts, but the money is neutral from a technological point of view so that broadband through fiber and mobile networks can be supported, he explains the secretary of state.

– The support scheme is technology neutral and we believe that both 5G and fiber development together will provide us with the next coverage, says Chaffey.