Claro Brasil has reportedly achieved downlink transmission speeds of up to 1Gbps in a trial which leveraged LTE-Licence Assisted Access (LTE-LAA) technology. According to TeleTime, the tests utilised a 20MHz block of 2.5GHz 4G spectrum alongside 60MHz of unlicensed 5GHz Wi-Fi spectrum. TeleGeography notes that LTE-LAA was standardised by industry body the 3GPP (as part of Release 13).
In related news, Claro Brasil CEO Paulo Cesar Teixeira has informed local media representatives that the telco is on course to extend its LTE-A network – billed as ‘4.5G’ by the operator – to eleven major markets by end-2017. The cities in question have been named as: Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte, Vitoria, Porto Alegre, Florianopolis, Curitiba, Salvador, Sao Luis, Campinas and Brasilia. Mr Teixeira added the Claro’s entire 18,500-tower network will be upgraded for LTE-A by the end of 2018.
According to TeleGeography’s GlobalComms Database, the network was launched in Brasilia in June this year, and utilises 4×4 Massive MIMO technology alongside 256QAM functionality. The Brasilia LTE-A network reportedly combines 10MHz of 700MHz spectrum with 5MHz of 1800MHz spectrum and 20MHz of 2600MHz spectrum, for a total tri-band carrier aggregation (3C) of 35MHz.