Verizon Reaches 'Key Milestone' In 5G Race As T-Mobile Calls BS On Deployment Timeline

It seems like just yesterday we were introduced to 4G LTE wireless connectivity, but technology marches forward and a rapid pace and its successor is waiting in the wings. Verizon Wireless, the United States’ largest wireless carrier, says that it has completed a “key milestone” in the development of 5G wireless technologies.

Verizon claims that it is the first U.S. wireless carrier to compete its 5G radio specification, which gives the company firm guidelines for how to validate hardware that is incorporated into the next generation wireless standard. This allows everyone involved in the industry — chipset vendors, mobile operators, etc. — to be on the same page when it comes to interoperability.

“The completion of the 5G radio specification is a key milestone toward the development of a complete 5G specification,” said Adam Koeppe, VP Network Technology Planning. “The level of collaboration that we are seeing exceeds what we saw during 4G. This agile way of developing the specification and working with the ecosystem will enable us to get to market rapidly.”

When its 5G network is fully operational, Verizon says that customers will enjoy “several gigabits per second throughputs and single-millisecond latencies.” The company also says that 5G provides roughly 50 times the throughput of current, mainstream 4G LTE solutions. We aren’t going to argue with dramatically higher transfer speeds and lower latencies, so we say bring it on.

Verizon’s current 5G trials are underway in New Jersey, Massachusetts, and Texas, and is working closely with other 5G Technology Forum partners including Cisco, Ericsson, Intel, LG, Nokia, Samsung, and Qualcomm.

Verizon originally stated that it would begin commercial rollouts of 5G in 2017, while most other industry experts expect that 5G won’t be feasible for widespread adoption until 2020 at the earliest. 

T-Mobile CEO John Legere is incredibly skeptical of the 2017 timeframe, telling investors on a February earnings call that Verizon’s 5G claims are “pure horseshit.” Chief Technology Officer Neville Ray added during that same call, “Verizon trying to move and say they’re going to be the first to 5G; it’s kinda BS to be honest.”