US: Verizon’s ‘5G’ fixed wireless access service to go live on 1 October

Verizon, a mobile network operator in the US, will launch Verizon 5G Home – which it claims will be the world’s first commercial 5G broadband internet service – on October 1.

The company says that 5G Home customers should expect typical network speeds of around 300 Mbps and, depending on location, peak speeds of nearly 1 Gbps, with no data caps.

The service will initially use Verizon’s proprietary 5G TF standard but Verizon will upgrade those who sign up to its First On 5G scheme to the hardware, software, chipsets, and devices based on the 3GPP 5G NR (new radio) standard free of charge, once it can obtain these from its 5G technology partners.

“We spent the last three years driving the industry to bring 5G to consumers as soon as possible,” said Ronan Dunne, head of Verizon’s wireless business. “We developed early standards that allowed the industry and hardware and software manufacturers to build solutions more quickly. As a result of this initiative and ongoing collaboration, we will rapidly deliver the promise of 5G to our customers.”