Italian telco Wind Tre says it expects to complete a trial of 5G services with Chinese vendor ZTE before the end of this year. The operator’s CTO Benoit Hanssen also said that the company plans to launch a trial NB-IoT network in 2019.
The executive told RCR Wireless News: ‘Wind Tre and local fibre-optic network operator Open Fiber decided to collaborate with ZTE to deploy two 5G networks in L’Aquila and Prato. In October 2017 the three parties jointly developed the first pre-commercial 5G network in Europe, taking an important step toward commercial 5G use.’ He added: ‘In Italy, the main challenge we face in deploying 5G is physical rather than technical. Italy’s radiation requirements are far higher than other countries. We need to place antennas in appropriate places to reduce radiation and meet government requirements.’
Wind Tre is backed by Hong Kong-based group CK Hutchison.