Bell Canada claims it is the first in North America to roll out commercial tri-band LTE Advanced (LTE-A) network technology, giving customers in Toronto, Hamilton, Oakville and Halifax access to mobile data downlink speeds up to a theoretical maximum 290Mbps from 21 August 2015, when the new Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+ and Galaxy Note5 smartphones become available. Expected average mobile data speeds are 12Mbps to 87Mbps.
Bell will expand its new tri-band 290Mbps LTE-A network – based on 700MHz, 2100MHz (AWS) and 2600MHz spectrum – across other cities in due course. Bell says it introduced 220Mbps LTE-A services (expected average downlink 12Mbps to 60Mbps) in February this year by combining bands to increase network capacity and data speeds, and discloses that the LTE-A network is now available in more than 40 communities across Canada. Meanwhile, Bell has continued to raise LTE coverage (peak speeds of 75Mbps-150Mbps, average 12Mbps-40Mbps) via 700MHz rollouts in smaller towns and remote areas, currently reaching a 93% national LTE population footprint and aiming for ‘more than 98%’ by the end of 2015.
Blaik Kirby, president of Bell Mobility, said: ‘Tri-band LTE-A is a turbo boost for data-intensive activities such as streaming HD video, playing graphics-intense multiplayer games, or downloading large business files.’