Vodafone Spain announced it will start to provide 5G coverage via the 700 MHz frequency in 109 municipalities in 30 provinces progressively from today, after the telco secured 2×10 megahertz of spectrum in the 700 MHz band in July.
The telco noted that this first deployment on the 700 Mhz frequency includes 54 municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants and 55 with less than 50,000 inhabitants.
Vodafone highlighted that the 5G network in the 700 MHz frequency will allow it to expand its coverage footprint extensively and offer better coverage also in interiors of buildings.
Vodafone said that this first deployment integrates with the progressive update of 700 MHz in the 25 large cities already covered with 5G in 2019. Specifically, 17 of the 25 large cities will see the coverage that they already had with 3.5 GHz in the first wave strengthened or increased. These initial cities are Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Seville, Malaga, Zaragoza, San Sebastián, Pamplona, Logroño, Toledo, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Palma de Mallorca, Valladolid and Murcia, Segovia, Castellón and Las Palmas de Gran Canaria.
Other cities including A Coruña, Vigo, Gijón, Santander, Bilbao, Vitoria, Badajoz and Alicante will be updated throughout the year with the 700 MHz frequency.
Vodafone will continue to boost coverage using the 700 MHz frequencies until reaching 30% of municipalities with up to 50,000 inhabitants in December.
“With this first deployment in the 700 MHz band, our goal is to continue popularizing 5G services so that the benefits of a connected society are available to everyone and no one is left behind,” said Julia Velasco, Network Director of Vodafone Spain. “Vodafone will continue to deploy a 5G network in new municipalities so that both companies and individual customers can accelerate the recovery and take advantage of the digital transformation,” she added.
The company already turned on the 5G network in the municipality of Villacarrillo (Jaén) in September, making it the first rural municipality to have this 5G connectivity in the 700 MHz frequency band. Although Vodafone had previously carried out drone flights connected to the 5G network, it was in this location where the operator made the first drone flight using the 700 MHz frequency.
The first flight on the 700 MHz frequency was developed within the framework of the tests carried out together with the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation to analyze the coexistence of 5G with DTT in the 700 MHz band in Spain, and within the project “5G Andalusia Pilot” promoted by the Ministry of Economy and Business, through Red.es.
Vodafone initially launched 5G services in Spain via NSA architecture in 2019 while the telco launched a pre-commercial 5G SA network in June 2021.
Last month, the Spanish government has kicked off the process to auction more spectrum for 5G mobile services in the country.
The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation recently published a public consultation on the demand and the management and exploitation model of the 26 GHz frequency band, one of the bands identified as priority for the development of 5G technology, together with the 700 MHz and 3.5 GHz bands.
The 26 GHz band is the last spectrum band that remains to be assigned to Spanish carriers for 5G.
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