Optus, together with technology partner Nokia, has claimed "a new 5G record achieving 10Gbps aggregated throughput on a live 5G site in Strathpine, Brisbane further strengthening its ambition to deliver Australia’s fastest 5G."

Through the use of its "unique spectrum assets" Optus says the 10Gbps throughput "was achieved by aggregating Optus’ 5G spectrum bands of 3500Mhz and 28Ghz (mmWave) on top of existing 4G spectrum band layers to deliver unprecedented bandwidth and speed, giving customers a glimpse of what they can expect once mmWave is available commercially."

Lambo Kanagaratnam, Optus Managing Director Networks said: Today’s accomplishment is yet another 5G milestone for Optus as we push hard to deliver our customers with Australia’s fastest 5G network. We already know that 5G is fast but what we’re seeing here is innovative use of spectrum layers to deliver a single site with over 10Gbps throughput.

"This is a fantastic demonstration of how mmWave spectrum, integrated into existing 5G and 4G sites, has the capability to significantly boost overall site capacity – which will be a gamechanger for our customers.

“In addition to an increase in total site throughput, this test has demonstrated a significant increase in single user peak speed. We are currently seeing commercial single user peak speeds of around 1-2Gbps on our existing 5G sites, but once the 5G mmWave layer is added we expect to see peak speeds closer to 4Gbps.

"This additional capacity and faster per user speed will be incredibly important for our Enterprise customers, paving the way for a range of low-latency and ultra-high bandwidth services not available today.”

Optus says increased 5G site capacity "will also ensure that customers in densely populated areas or locations where there is a large network demand, will be able to access the network without compromising the performance of their applications.

"For example, without the added mmWave layer average peak site capacity is around 3Gbps, which would typically support around 75 individual 4K video streams simultaneously per 5G site. Adding the mmWave spectrum layer and increasing site capacity to 10Gbps has the potential to support around 250 4K video streams per 5G site - an uplift of more than 230 percent.

"The 10Gbps recorded was a consolidated speed across multiple users by harnessing the full capability of such a high capacity network."

Anna Wills, Head of Oceania at Nokia said, ‘This is another milestone in the development of 5G services and demonstrates the confidence operators have in our 5G solutions. Today’s achievement with Optus shows the potential of mmWave deployments, particularly at a time when connectivity and capacity are so crucial. We’re proud of our long-standing relationship with Optus and the great strides we continue to make together in this new era of connectivity.’

Optus reminds us that it currently has "more than 1200 5G sites covering over 830,000 households in Australia."