Polish cellco P4 (Play) is following up last month’s pilot 5G 2100MHz network launch in the Tri-City agglomeration (Gdansk, Gdynia and Sopot) by switching on a total of 500 5G base stations across 16 cities by the end of this month, including the country’s five largest metropolises – Warsaw, Krakow, Wroclaw, Gdansk and Gdynia – and eleven smaller cities: Sopot, Augustow, Zakopane, Szczyrk, Bukowina Tatrzanska, Karpacz, Gizycko, Wladyslawowo, Mrągowo, Kolobrzeg and Ustka.
Jean Marc Harion, President of Play, declared: ‘Thanks to the intensive development of 5G infrastructure and experience gathered in the Tri-City, [as well as pilots in the towns of] Torun, Sokolow Podlaski and Grojec, we are ready to commercialise 5G.’ The company’s press release added: ‘Obtaining the first commercial radio permits from [regulator] UKE allows us to offer Polish consumers the latest generation technology before major phone manufacturers launch their first 5G devices on the market … [Play] is waiting for the launch of the [3.5GHz] frequency auction … to acquire one block of the band and use it to further increase the transmission speed in 5G technology.’