Vodacom Introduces First Commercial 5G Service in Africa

Vodacom Group has announced its creation of a standards-based, commercial 5G service in Lesotho, Africa.

The 5G service was initially using the 3.5GHz spectrum to deliver Fixed Wireless Access broadband services to two enterprise customers in Lesotho.

5G technology for is great news for Vodacom subscribers in Lesotho as it presents faster deployment of broadband services with fiber-like speeds.

Early access to the new technology will see entrepreneurs, industry shapers, and government work with Vodacom to develop and incubate innovative applications to power digital transformation in the near future in Lesotho.

The group also announced that it has deployed the same standards-based 5G technology in South Africa, with speeds in excess of 700 Mbps and latencies of less than 10 milliseconds. This will exceed 1Gbps as new software versions and devices become available but until 3.5GHz spectrum are available to Vodacom South Africa, this 5G network will not be available to its customers.

“Vodacom prides itself on being a market leader and we are extremely pleased to be first to deliver 5G services to customers in Africa. What we’ve accomplished in Lesotho is an example of what can be achieved in Africa, should the requisite spectrum also be made available.

Global technological advancements are evolving at a rapid pace and South Africa can’t afford to be left behind, particularly when we look at some of the potential use cases for 5G to support critical sectors of our society such as health care and education,” said Vodacom Group Chief Executive Officer, Shameel Joosub. 

Vodacom Group prides in leading the market with being the first to introduce networks such as 2G, 3G and 4G in South Africa and has now also introduced 5G to the continent.

In Lesotho, Vodacom has been assigned spectrum in the 3.5GHz band enabling the launch of a commercial 5G service while in South Africa, it has been granted a temporary spectrum license of 100MHz in the 3.5GHz band to showcase the same standards-based 5G network capabilities in South Africa.

The 3.5GHz spectrum band is considered optimal for 5G network deployments due to its suitability for throughput and capacity and it is not dependent on the digital migration in South Africa.

The 3.5GHz band has sufficient indoor penetration traits and will assist in the facilitation of a broad range of consumer and business applications such as smart factories, autonomous vehicles and augmented reality.

Vodacom has deployed advanced 5G Active Antennae, commonly known as Multiple Input Multiple Output (Massive MIMO) to provide improved spectral efficiency and coverage, enabling increased network capacity.