Nokia and U.S. Cellular are adding 5G mmWave capabilities in the 24 GHz and 28 GHz spectrum bands.

U.S. Cellular will deploy Nokia’s AirScale portfolio, with Cloud RAN capabilities, to provide enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB) 5G mmWave.  

The Nokia AirFrame open edge solution for Cloud RAN will also be included in the deployments, enabling a virtualized RAN that provides scalable benefits such as, significant Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) reduction through simplification automation and operation efficiency gains, as well as through the support of open ecosystems. 

 To support U.S. Cellular’s advanced IoT and enterprise customers, the company has also opted to include Nokia’s Worldwide IoT Network Grid (WING) solution as a deployment component, which allows the scaling of 5G IoT services faster and more cost-effectively. 

 U.S. Cellular is beginning its multi-year deployment of 5G mmWave now, with commercial availability planned for 2021.