MTN Nigeria Communications Limited 5G internet network has gone live today, the telecommunications giant, won the 3.5GHz spectrum licence for 5G network rollout since December last year, coupled with the issuance of 5G spectrum licence in May this year.
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The Chief Executive Officer of MTN Nigeria, Mr. Karl Toriola had said MTN was ready for rollout, having the required 5G equipment on ground.
MTN is commencing the rollout of its 5G network today from Lagos and Abuja, with plans to cover five cities within one month of rollout. The cities include Lagos, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Enugu and Kano. Some users are reporting internet speeds of up to 1.4g per second.
Owing to the development, MTN has called on telecom subscribers to begin pre-order of their 5G devices to enable them enjoy the high speed internet download with low latency that are associated with 5G, since not all devices can access 5G network.
Only a handful of handsets were able to access the 5G service because of the modification and software upsdates that are required to enable such handsets to engage the 5G service in Nigeria.
And for the subscribers using either apple or Samsung handsets, there is likely going to be some wait for the phone manufacturers to deliver on the update.
While Samsung might be able to make the modification required for Nigerian subscribers to use the 5G service in about a month to six weeks, iPhone users might have to wait till October.
Also Read: Nigeria Set To Launch 5G Internet Network, Issues Guidelines.
While MTN has launched the Fifth-Generation (5G) service, Mafab Communications then other winner of the 5G license has, however, been given a five-month extension for the rollout of the service in Nigeria.
The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) had given MTN Nigeria Communications Limited and Mafab Communications Limited up till today to begin commercial rollout of their 5G networks across the country. But Mafab Communications Limited appears missing from the rollout plan for technical reasons, thereby leaving only MTN to begin the race.
Mafab Communications in a statement this week, had said the NCC issued it a 5-month extension period for its roll out.
MTN and Mafab, had in December 2021, won the 3.5GHz Spectrum band for 5G license and the NCC had given both operators up till August 24, to rollout 5G technology services across the country
