DoCoMo squeezes 120Mbps out of LTE

Japanese carrier NTT DoCoMo said Monday that it has successfully field tested LTE technology, claiming wireless transmissions in the range of 120Mbps in an urban environment.

In partnership with local equipment manufacturer Fujitsu, DoCoMo deployed a 4×4 MIMO-based LTE network in a special testing area in the northern Japanese city of Sapporo in Hokkaido using 10MHz of spectrum.

Using prototypes of LTE base stations developed jointly by DoCoMo and Fujitsu Laboratories, the test network was able to transfer data to a device at around 120Mbps. DoCoMo reckons this would be equivalent to 240Mbps throughput using the 20MHz maximum bandwidth that LTE allows.

Fujitsu was selected by DoCoMo in 2006 to be the developer and manufacturer of its LTE base stations. The companies said that they have also performed successful tests of a prototype three-sector LTE base station that has a transmission capacity of 300Mbps per sector on the downlink using 20MHz of spectrum.