- Vodafone New Zealand customers will be able to experience 5G at no extra cost until the end of June 2020
- The company is using a 3.5 GHz spectrum to launch 5G
Vodafone New Zealand has launched commercial 5G services in parts of Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and Queenstown.
As part of an initial commercial offering, Vodafone New Zealand customers will be able to experience 5G at no extra cost until the end of June 2020, after which an add-on will be available for NZD10 ($6.53) per connection, per month.
“This is just the beginning of a new technology era for New Zealand. We expect Vodafone New Zealand customers using 5G to experience mobile download speeds of potentially 5-10 times the current 4G speeds. This means Kiwis can download large files like movies much more quickly and start to experience a new world of entertainment such as cloud-based gaming – while businesses can further innovate with new technologies and connected devices,” said Jason Paris, Vodafone New Zealand CEO.
The fifth-generation network
He added, “The fifth-generation network will mean our cities and communities can become more connected, smarter, safer and healthier. 5G represents greater speed, latency, capacity, and security – as well as an enhanced internet of things. If 4G was the era of the smartphone, 5G will be the era of connected everything.”
The company said that it will continue to build the 5G network over the coming few years, adding Nokia 5G technology to more than 1,500 existing cell sites around the country.
“We’re using 3.5 GHz spectrum to launch 5G, and our current radio spectrum holdings will mean that Vodafone customers see an uplift of up to 10 times current 4G speeds. However to reach the one-gigabit speeds that we’re seeing internationally, we’ll need approximately 100 megahertz of 3.5 GHz spectrum so will continue to work with the government on the early allocation and auction processes,” said Tony Baird, Vodafone New Zealand Technology Director.
