Ericsson and Swisscom have stepped up their 5G game by setting up end-to-end, multivendor 5G Non-Standalone (NSA) data call on 3.5 GHz band in the Swiss city of Burgdorf. Swisscom aims to be the first mobile operator in Switzerland to offer 5G services, pending the definitive outcome of commercial spectrum in the country. The operator plans to roll out 5G services in selected locations by end of 2018.

The end-to-end 5G data call was made over Swisscom’s 3GPP-compliant network using Ericsson Radio System radio, baseband and transport solutions, as well as the Ericsson Cloud Packet Core operated on a system-verified Ericsson NFVi solution. Data transmissions were carried out using Intel’s Mobile Trial Platform (MTP) device and Swisscom’s 5G-subscribed SIM card.

Swisscom has also selected Ericsson to deliver a new end-to-end 5G IP transport network to meet the mobile operator’s demands for scalability, availability, performance, and lower latency. The end-to-end 5G transport network increases capacity, adds automation and provides advanced features for its radio and core networks that will enable extreme low latency and new 5G industry use cases.

Swisscom and Ericsson demonstrated end-to-end network slicing on Ericsson’s 4G and 5G network solutions at Mobile World Congress 2018. In November 2017, Swisscom selected Ericsson as a strategic supplier for Gigabit LTE and 5G.