Kanagaratnam Lambotharan

The advent of long-term evolution (LTE) in SA may be imminent, as the country’s second-largest cellphone operator explores the possibility of switching on a commercial “4G” network this year.

LTE, generally construed as the next generation to prevalent 3G telecommunications technologies like High-Speed Package Access (HSPA) and Evolved HSPA (HSPA+), has increasingly been making local headlines since just over a year ago.

MTN, which initiated an LTE pilot test in Gauteng on 14 July last year, has now hinted that commercial rollout of the technology is likely in parts of Johannesburg, Pretoria and Durban – within the next four months.

At the time of MTN’s initial pilot project, the operator said the technology would transform the provision of broadband services in SA.

Kanagaratnam Lambotharan, CTO of MTN SA, recently echoed the optimistic stance with reference to the imminent commercial availability of LTE in SA: “MTN hopes that, with the commercial launch, its subscribers can optimally tap into future services and applications that the LTE ecosystem is expected to provide.”

Now, a year down the line since MTN started piloting LTE in a bid to fi ne-tune the technology and “acquire better knowledge and experience about it”, Lambotharan says about 200 LTE sites are currently live.