Telstra's 42Mb/s network - 'plenty of gas left in HSPA'

Telstra boss David Thodey says the company's 42Mb/s-capable network future proofs it for high-demand devices.

Australian telco Telstra used the annual Mobile World Congress in Barcelona as the platform for its solution to head off capacity problems as an increasing plethora of data hungry devices connect to mobile networks.

Telstra said it had completed upgrading its network to HSPA+ Dual Carrier with peak speeds of 42 megabits per second and become the first telco in the world to commercially deploy this network technology.

"The completion of the HSPA+ Dual Carrier upgrade will mean a better customer experience in areas of high demand, making the Telstra Next network better placed to deal with the capacity demands that are causing headaches for other carriers around the world," Telstra chief executive David Thodey.

Thodey wasn't present in person at the trade show as planned with Telstra business, including the negotiations with the Australian government over the tipping into the national broadband network of the telco giant's network assets, keeping him in Australia.

A demonstration of the technology was running at the Barcelona trade show using a Sierra Wireless data device that will go on sale later this year.

The capability to connect to the higher speed network is likely to be available in phones and other devices within the next year.

The HSPA+ Dual Carrier technology achieves the higher speeds by sending and receiving wireless data using two channels simultaneously.

Peak speeds are generally on available in perfect conditions and Telstra said actual customer download speeds will always lower.

It said customers using the device demonstrated yesterday would experience typical speeds in selected locations around double those seen with the fastest 3G devices available in Australia today.

This latest iteration of HSPA technology allows the company to wring as much out of its existing spectrum.

Telstra executive director of wireless Michael Wright said the company continues to keep an eye on developments in LTE, the next generation of high speed mobile networks, "but there's plenty of gas left in the HSPA tank".

Alongside the demo of the soon-to-be-released data device, Telstra's technology partners Ericsson were yesterday showing off a device connected to an HSPA+ network at close to its theoretical maximum of 84 megabits per second.

Telstra said it would be boosting network speeds using the new version of the HSPA+ technology - HSPA+ Dual Carrier plus MIMO – in 2011.

The telco have already indicated it plans to roll out the next generation of high speed mobile networks, LTE, and said yesterday further announcements would be made on progress later this year.

The Mobile World Congress is the biggest date of the year in the mobile telecommunications industry with around 40,000 people attending the four day event.

On day one there was an absence of new device announcements despite the huge variety on display on the floor of the trade fair.

Operating systems were the topic of the day with both Microsoft and a collaboration between phone maker Nokia and technology company Intel announcing new operating systems.

The Nokia/Intel press conference attracted half hour long queues with journalists overflowing the offsite venue used for the announcement.

Nokia's executive vice president of devices Kai Oistamo said consumers would be able to run applications created using MeeGo Linux-based platform on a number of devices and be able to move favourite applications easily between different devices.

The Nokia/Intel Meego operating system will go head to head with Apple's iPhone OS, Android and the latest Microsoft development, Windows Phone 7, also announced.

- NZHERALD STAFF