Rogers Communications reports that it has launched the first commercial 5G standalone (SA) network in Canada. Ericsson is the primary vendor.
Most operators launched 5G using the non-standalone (NSA) version of 5G, where the core is anchored in 4G LTE. With the SA version of 5G, there's no reliance on 4G and there's end-to-end support for 5G speeds and services.
“We are thrilled to be the first in Canada to launch a commercial 5G standalone service,” said Rogers CTO Jorge Fernandes in a statement. “This milestone underscores our ongoing leadership in 5G and will bring immediate benefits to customers by increasing coverage, scalability and availability, and improving network response times, enabling a world of new use cases and applications.”
Rogers noted that its 5G SA Core network has been built from the ground up based on the latest cloud native technologies, enabling more advanced wireless capabilities like ultra-low latency, network slicing and mobile edge computing and expanding Rogers 5G footprint.
Rogers 5G SA also will support the “unprecedented growth” of IoT devices in the years to come, the operator added. 5G Core and 5G RAN slicing enables Rogers to deliver new services to customers, such as dedicated private networks, public safety applications and access to edge compute for AR/VR consumer applications.
“Today’s launch delivers exciting new opportunities and capabilities to industries, businesses and consumers across Canada,” said Ericsson Canada CTO Yasir Hussain in a statement. “Ericsson is collaborating with our partners at Rogers to deliver 5G advanced services and innovative network solutions to meet the growing demand from Canadian companies and consumers.”
The first devices to be certified on the network are the Google Pixel 6 and Google Pixel 6 Pro. Wireless customers with capable devices will automatically connect to the 5G SA service where it has been rolled out; Rogers said it will be onboarding other major devices later in the year.
Last year, Rogers Communications announced plans to acquire Shaw Commmunications. Earlier this month, Rogers released a statement saying it still expects that deal to close in the first half of 2022.
5G standalone elsewhere
Vodafone Germany last year was the first operator to launch 5G standalone in Europe. A couple weeks ago, Vodafone and Ericsson said they’ve successfully completed the U.K.’s first 5G standalone network slicing trial, but Vodafone didn’t say when it will launch a commercial SA 5G network in the U.K.
In the U.S., T-Mobile remains the only national carrier to have launched a standalone 5G network, although it’s been mostly mum about how it’s actually putting those features into practice.
At its investor meeting earlier this month, Verizon said it’s early days for implementing standalone capabilities but it’s “making great progress” with its partners on that front. It will start moving fixed wireless accounts onto the 5G core in June, with mobility traffic moving onto the 5G core in 2023. Verizon has said those moves will allow it to support network slicing use cases.
Last fall, AT&T was still in the testing phase of standalone 5G and wasn't saying when it would deploy the technology. The operator did not have any new updates at last check.