One year ago, T-Mobile Austria and Huawei presented the first LTE tests in a specially configured test network in Austria. The speed and potential of LTE were demonstrated as part of a showcase in the T-Mobile Shop on Vienna's Rennweg thoroughfare: the usability of key applications with high bandwidth and latency requirements - such as file downloads, video streaming, web browsing and video telephony - was demonstrated under real network conditions. Speeds of over 130 Mbit/s were reached via an air interface for the very first time, while four modems were simultaneously registered with one cell. "Our vision is mobile broadband coverage for everyone, and our LTE-related commitment is a key prerequisite for realizing it", says DI Robert Chvátal, Chairman of the Management Board at T-Mobile Austria. "We are pioneers of this technical innovation in Austria, which in turn enables us to give customers a state-of-the-art mobile broadband experience."

Huawei's LTE test network in Vienna and Innsbruck

Alongside extensive laboratory tests at its sister company in Bonn, T-Mobile has been operating a specially installed live network for LTE tests for over a year. The network runs on the 2.6 GHz frequency band and was the largest test network in Europe at the time it was established. "As a pioneer in LTE, T-Mobile has gained crucial experience with the next generation of mobile communications technology from the tests in Vienna and Innsbruck", says Dr. Rüdiger Köster, Managing Director of Technology at T-Mobile Austria. "With our test network, we have gleaned evidence based on first-hand customer experience while putting the technology through its paces. In particular, we focused on aspects such as quality, stability and reliability in different environments, such as in the city center or the road network in and around Innsbruck."

Rapid market developments show potential of the new technology

Today, almost a year to the day later, T-Mobile demonstrated that the new mobile communications technology has already reached market maturity. "A year ago, the modems we used for our showcase were each as big as a tower PC. Today, together with Samsung Austria, we can demonstrate the first market-ready LTE stick, which is the same size as the current mobile Internet sticks, in a live network," says Chvátal.

Efficient solution for frequency auctions

Although the frequencies from the "digital dividend" were recently allocated to mobile communications, the overall situation of future mobile communications frequencies has not yet been finalized. When the existing frequency rights for mobile communications operators expire in 2015, continued use of the 900/1800 MHz frequencies is an open issue. "In Austria, we are asking for a speedy, shared allocation of frequencies from the digital dividend, with an extension of the currently used 900/1800 MHz frequencies," says Chvátal. "It is also very important to Austrian business that the existing 900/1800 MHz frequencies be opened for the use of new technologies. Our neighbors in Germany recently set a good example by starting auctions for several new frequency bands. As a result, mobile communications operators will be able to offer LTE and future technologies to their customers."