NBN achieves 1.1Gbps speeds in fixed wireless trial

Australia’s nbn, the state-owned company building the National Broadband Network, has achieved speeds of over 1Gbps during a trial of fixed wireless technology.

The company used carrier aggregation to combine seven 3.4-GHz carriers with four in the 2.3-GHz bands, achieving a downlink speed of 1.1Gbps and upstream speeds of 165Mbps.

Using a range of various carriers across the two bands, nbn also demonstrated trial peek speeds of 400Mbps/55Mbps, 250Mbps/50Mbps and 100Mbps/400Mbps.

The fastest 1.1Gbps speed was achieved by using three next generation Wireless Network Termination Devices (WNTDs) while the others were achieved with a single such device.

The trial was conducted with Ericsson, NetComm Wireless and Qualcomm, and used speed testing technology from Mill Software.

nbn has pledged to launch a 100Mbps fixed wireless product for the regional business segment in 2018.

“Our ability to deliver gigabit speeds on fixed wireless demonstrates our continued focus on identifying and implementing tech advancements as and when they are needed, across all technologies,” nbn CEO Bill Morrow said.

“It’s particularly exciting to be able to reaffirm our commitment to delivering a great experience to the 600,000 premises in regional Australia that will be served by the fixed wireless network. Our fixed wireless network has already been recognised as a world leader and we are determined to maintain that position by making sure regional Australians get access to the same high speed broadband available in our cities.