Telia launches updated 5G plans for 2021 – E24

– We are leading the launch of 5G in Norway and will maintain that position, says Stein-Erik Vellan, director of Telia Norway, during a digital press conference on Wednesday.

At the end of October, Telenor presented its 5G plans and promised full national coverage with an improved mobile network by the end of 2024. Telia, for its part, promises national coverage by the end of 2023.

When you really want to get 5G depends on two things: you must have a mobile or broadband modem that supports 5G, and you must live or travel in an area where coverage is on.

To check if there is 5G in the exact place you are traveling, you can go to the coverage maps of the mobile phone companies.

Both Telia and Telenor will invest billions in 5G development in the coming years. They are also updating their 4G networks at the same time, which will provide better capacity and speed there. Besides that, they are also improving their broadband networks.

In the same way that with the transition from 3G to 4G, mobile users will get even more speed, but 5G also brings some other benefits:

• Response time on the network is drastically decreasing, which is important for time-critical applications such as gaming and remote control of various types of vehicles or machines.
• The web is shareable – this is a new feature that will come eventually. This means that mobile phone companies can divide the network into different teams, which, for example, can ensure the reserved capacity of the emergency services themselves on a football field, even if all the spectators flood the network with photos and videos.

It will be implemented here in 2021.

– On May 12 of this year the starting shot was fired. When we turned on the first base station in Lillestrøm. Then Groruddalen followed. Trondheim followed in August, and Oslo and Bergen obtained in October and November, says Stein-Erik Vellan, CEO of Telia Norway.

During the presentation, he listed which areas will get 5G over the next year.

– We have roughly double the development ceiling in 2021 compared to 2020, says Espen Weum, head of mobile networks at Telia Norway.

In the first quarter, these areas will receive 5G:

• Asker, Bærum, Nesodden, Nordre Follo, Øygarden and Askøy
• Almost full coverage in Oslo within Ring 3
• More coverage in Bergen, even towards Flesland and Sotra
• More coverage in Trondheim, including the south and east
• Larger areas around Lillestrøm

In the second quarter, these areas will receive 5G:

• Stavanger, Sola and Sandnes
• Various Viken Townships: Eidsvoll, Enebakk, Nannestad, Frogn, Western City, Aurskog Highlands, Gjerdrum, Nittedal, Ullensaker

In the third quarter, these areas will receive 5G:

• Development in several inland municipalities, especially the former Østfold municipalities

More than 60,000 5G ready mobiles online

With Apple’s launch of the iPhone 12 this fall, where all variants of the model have 5G, the mobile offering for customers started to become much broader.

Competitors like Samsung and Huawei were already in place with 5G mobiles and with the entry of Apple, most of the new mobiles sold in this country will be ready for the new network.

– How is the 5G network mainly used today? Is it primarily wireless broadband or has mobile phone use started to show up in your statistics too?

– Are both. We see it in wireless broadband and we see it in other types of applications, where companies want to test the possibilities in this technology, says Vellan and continues:

– We also see it in the use of mobile devices, through the fact that we now have between 60,000 and 70,000 5G-compatible mobiles in our network.

This number is likely to increase dramatically in the future, as customers purchase new mobile phones.

However, there is still a long way to go before most of Telia’s customers have a 5G mobile, as the company had 2.2 million mobile customers at the end of the third quarter and because they quickly take one or two years between when the majority of the customer base changes mobile.

Cabin area evaluation

Competition for wireless broadband is an important factor in the development of the 5G network.

Telenor was the first to launch this product last spring, which together with fiber will serve as a replacement for those customers who in the future lose access to the copper network being closed by Telenor.

Wireless broadband gives you broadband over the mobile network in a certain direction and you cannot move. The advantage is that you do not have to deal with a data quota as in mobile broadband.

Both Telia and Telenor launched 5G wireless broadband this fall. Telenor has surpassed 70,000 clients on the product, but Telia will not yet say how many clients it has on the solution:

– You can divide this into three parts. The first is the private homes where we have delivered compared to the goals we have, says Vellan and continues:

– The other part, which charges the network in a completely opposite way, is the corporate market. There the recording is a little slower than we would have liked.

– The third part is wholesaling (wholesales, journal.anm.), Vellan points out.

Telia offers access to competitors such as NextGenTel or local broadband players that offer wireless broadband in their regions.

At the press conference, Telia was asked if they would deploy this service in typical cabin areas such as Hafjell, Sjusjøen and Blefjell:

– It can definitely be relevant. What we are looking for is to build 5G coverage where there is a need for additional capacity, and these areas are relevant, says Espen Weum, head of mobile networks at Telia Norway.

– From an environmental perspective, you don’t want to dig more than necessary in these areas, and with this technology we can avoid this and at the same time offer good speed and capacity, adds Stein-Erik Vellan.