SK Telecom And POSTECH Develop 5G Antenna Tech

SK Telecom and Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) has developed a 5G antenna control technology and filed for a patent, they announced.

The pair’s technology maintains call quality in ultra-high 28GHz spectrum 5G by controlling the electrical characteristic of the antenna.

Ultra-high frequency reception sensitivity is affected by how users hold their smartphones or the angle of their head, but this technology was developed to offset that, they said.

Increasing reception sensitivity also decreases the power consumption of smartphones.

Ultra-high spectrum such as 28GHz requires components to be placed in a smaller area compared to LTE, with SK Telecom and POSTECH saying they also took this into account when finishing testing for commercial launch.

SK Telecom, with compatriots KT and LG Uplus, is also preparing for the rollout of 5G in March in South Korea. The company excluded Huawei from its equipment vendor list in September last year.

SK Telecom is a close ally of Samsung Electronics and is extensively collaborating with them in 5G equipment research.―ZDNET