Rain, South African network operator rolls out the First Standalone 5G Network in Africa
Rain, South African data-only network operator, has rolled-out Africa’s first commercial standalone 5G network which is powered by Huawei.
The standalone 5G Network is currently available in the South African city of Cape Town and covers areas such as Sea Point, Claremont, Goodwood, Bellville, Durbanville, and Cape Town City Center.
CMO of Rain, Khaya Dlanga said, “Standalone 5G will further improve 5G network performance with increased uplink rate, lower latency, and improved reliability, ushering in high-end cloud VR and cloud gaming services, more diversified enterprise and home broadband services.”
“Standalone 5G will demonstrate how 5G is powerful in realizing South Africa’s 4IR future. Powered by Huawei’s global leading 5G solutions, our Standalone 5G will enable the industry’s digital transformation in the future, such as smart healthcare, smart ports, smart mining and smart manufacturing in South Africa,” Dlanga added.
According to Huawei, the new network will enable the mobile operator to significantly enhance its fixed wireless broadband (FWA) service experience in the covered areas.
The standalone 5G supports advanced network-slicing functions and mobile edge computing (MEC), enabling Rain to explore new customized services based on ultra-low latency and much higher capacity.
“Our SA 5G will enable the industries ‘digital transformation in the future, such as smart healthcare, smart ports, smart mining, and smart manufacturing in South Africa. We will work with our strategic partner to further expand our 5G networks and bring the best service and experience to our customers,” Dlanga added.
Aside from that, Rain has built additional 5G sites in Gauteng in recent months which is one of the telco’s expansion plans to deploy 5G in metro areas throughout South Africa in the next 18 months.
Already, Rain offers a fixed 5G service in parts of Johannesburg and Tshwane.
The data-only mobile network was founded in 2015.