NTT DoCoMo Successfully Conducts Real-World 5G Trials in Japan

NTT DoCoMo, Inc., a major mobile phone operator in Japan, announced on Thursday that it successfully conducted a 5G trial with Nokia Networks at the Roppongi Hills high-rise complex in Tokyo on October 13. It achieved ultra-high-speed data transmission in excess of 2Gbps, the company said in a press release.

“To date, no test had achieved a 5G data transmission in a commercial complex, such as a shopping mall, due to problems with base stations being out of line of sight and diffused reflections causing the attenuation of highly directional millimeter signals”, the press release said.

The company attributed the success of the trial to two new technologies: beamforming, which focuses radio waves in a specific direction, and beam tracking to control beam direction according to the mobile device's location.

In a separate trial that DOCOMO conducted with Samsung Electronics in Suwon-city, South Korea on November 12, a maximum data-receiving speed of over 2.5Gbps was achieved in a vehicle travelling with a speed of 60km/h.

The company has been collaborating with a number of world-leading vendors in trials and development of 5G mobile communication technologies since May last year and aims at the commercial launch of a 5G next-generation mobile communications system by 2020.