Poland’s largest mobile operator by subscribers, Orange Polska, says it now has more than 7,700 4G LTE base stations in operation nationwide, covering around 96% of the population. These include 1,004 stations operating in the 800MHz band, 6,734 at 1800MHz and 52 at 2600MHz. A report from Telepolis says that dual-band carrier aggregation (CA) is available at 140 locations, providing peak theoretical download speeds of up to 225Mbps, while tri-band carrier aggregation (3C) – offering speeds of up to 300Mbps – can be accessed at four sites. Orange aims to have LTE networks reaching 98% of the population by the end of this year.
Meanwhile, Orange Polska says it has conducted lab tests in conjunction with Huawei which have achieved LTE download speeds of 1.91Gbps. The trials used 100MHz of spectrum across five bands – 800MHz, 900MHz, 1800MHz, 2100MHz and 2600MHz – with each channel capable of transmitting data at 382Mbps.
Prior to this year Orange could only offer 4G services thanks to an 1800MHz network sharing venture with T-Mobile Poland as it lacked suitable wireless spectrum, but having won 800MHz and 2600MHz frequencies in last year’s auction it went on to launch LTE services under its own steam in February.