Vodafone, one of UK’s leading mobile operators, on Wednesday announced it has successfully completed testing voice- over-LTE (VoLTE) at its Newbury, Berkshire laboratory, paving way for the technology’s commercial roll out.
During the trial test, the mobile operator used the Voice over LTE (VoLTE) technology to carry out phone call using their 4G network, the same way how 2G and 3G network is used today.
Vodafone says the new upcoming technology promises of clearer and higher-quality calls with lower levels of background noise, improved video conferencing without buffering or pixelating as well as a faster call set-up time.
It is expected that 4G calling technology will help save battery life and will also allow users to maintain a data connection while calling.
Vodafone CTO Fergal said the VoLTE trial, which comes within one year of 4G launch, is the next major innovation coming from the company. Fergal said the trial is also quite important as the company continues to work to build the UK’s best network.
Vodafone recently expanded 4G network coverage to 263 towns and cities in the UK as part of a £1 billion UK rollout initiative.
Vodafone’s Ed Cowmeadow, who worked on the technology, said modern mobile network technologies make use of certain ‘modulation schemes’ to transfer data and 4G has a much greater ‘spectral efficiency’ than 3G or 2G network. This means that the upcoming VoLTE technology will allow users to do more in a shorter period of time all because of the way 4G maximises the use of the radio resources.
The mobile operator claims it will now continue to test and develop the service further as it works toward the technology’s future commercial launch.
