Sri Lanka Telecom Mobitel carried out a successful trial of LTE (Long Term Evolution) Technology achieving speeds of up to 96 Mbps in downlink and 49Mbps in uplink using LTE technology, setting yet another record in the region.
Nimal Welgama, Chairman, Sri Lanka Telecom Mobitel said, “technology advances are among the key drivers that push outwards a country’s Production Possibility Frontier catalysing economic growth. As such, Mobitel has committed to embrace and offer the latest and the most advanced technologies that are needed for Sri Lanka’s rapid development.”
The reason behind the super-fast speeds demonstrated in LTE technology when compared with advanced 3G technologies is that the spectral efficiency is four to five times greater in LTE than in the latter. The use of OFDM (Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing) carrier modulation in LTE allows easy upward scalability for higher bandwidth requirements, which effectively uses multiple antennae in both the Terminal Device (Data Dongle, Smart Phone) and radio network to transmit and receive multiple streams of information within the same spectrum. Initiatives are under way to explore operations at other spectrum bands for commercial deployment.
Witnessing this trial Anusha Palpita, Director General of Telecommunications said “TRCSL is committed to assist all the telecommunication operators in Sri Lanka to develop world class telecommunication network facilities in the country. The spectrum allocation for the commercial operation of LTE will soon be finalised where the operators will be able to launch nationwide enhanced ICT infrastructure to benefit all businesses and consumers in Sri Lanka through this latest evolution in mobile broadband technology.” Mobitel hopes to leverage on this trial to set up a commercial network that will build on the immense potential this technology offers for a wide variety of end-user offerings.
