Ericsson, T-Mobile ink $3.5 bn deal to facilitate 5G deployment
Swedish communication services giant Ericsson and US-based wireless network operator T-Mobile on Wednesday signed a multi-year contract worth $3.5 billion to support the latter's nationwide deployment of 5G network.
As part of the agreement, Ericsson would provide T-Mobile with the latest 5G New Radio (NR) hardware and software compliant with the "Third Generation Partnership Project" (3GPP) standards.
"We have recently decided to increase our investments in the US to be closer to our leading customers and better support them with their accelerated 5G deployments and we are excited about our partnership with T-Mobile," said Niklas Heuveldop, President and Head of Ericsson in North America.
Deployment of 5G networks promises to deliver very high data speeds, extreme low latency, high reliability, energy efficiency and extreme device densities.
Ericsson would also provide its digital services solutions to T-Mobile, including dynamic orchestration, business support systems (BSS) and Ericsson Cloud Core for faster 5G deployment, Ericsson said.
As part of the deal, T-Mobile's already installed base of "Ericsson Radio System", radios will be able to run 5G NR technology with simple remote software installation.
"With this new Ericsson agreement we're laying the groundwork for 5G," said Neville Ray, Chief Technology Officer, T-Mobile.
Deployment of 5G networks would make way for the advancements and developments to come to Long-Term Evolution (LTE) -- which is a standard for high-speed wireless communication for mobile devices and data terminals.
