Vodafone Ireland is to test drive a new wireless home broadband technology at four locations in rural areas, using 5G mobile technology to establish the possibility of operating a dedicated rural wireless network, where customers connect to the internet via Vodafone wireless broadband.

The trial begins later this month in Roscommon, Gorey, Clonmel and Dungarvan and will cover over 20,000 premises. It will use Ericsson 5G equipment to provide wireless access in the 3.6GHz band. 

This network will handle only the broadband traffic of these customers, and could potentially allow peak download speeds up to 500Mbps at present, increasing to Gigabit speeds in the future. 

Vodafone's interim chief technology officer Max Gasparroni  (pictured) said: “Connectivity and connected technologies are impacting every facet of our lives today, and there is a huge demand all over Ireland for high speed broadband access.  “Vodafone is driving forward with our ambition to create a gigabit society in Ireland, and this trial will allow us to look at how we can enhance and extend broadband access to our customers in the most rural parts of the country.”

In Association with