Japan’s second largest mobile operator KDDI and South Korea-based Samsung completed a range of pre-standard 5G tests on a racetrack and demonstrated the handover of a 5G device from one base station to another at a speed of 192km/h.

The companies claim the handover, using 5G millimeter wave (mmWave) technology, is the fastest recorded in the world.

Conducted at Everland Speedway in South Korea, the demonstration involved a battery of individual tests to examine the performance of Samsung’s end-to-end 5G mmWave technology. Specifically, as a vehicle accelerated from 0 to 205km per hour between multiple 5G base stations, the test measured and evaluated metrics including handover interruption time, uplink and downlink throughput stability, and latency stability.

Woojune Kim, SVP and head of next generation strategy in networks business at Samsung, said: “It is becoming increasingly important that we accelerate our focus on 5G’s ability to meet a growing number of performance metrics. Until now, peak bandwidth has been the common refrain, and certainly a big component of the future of 5G. However, the test we conducted with KDDI will help us build a more diverse portfolio of future 5G use cases.”

Akira Matsunaga, senior director of mobile network technical development at KDDI, said: “The trial showcased stable performance under high-speed mobility conditions which will dramatically increase the service experience of users in vehicles.”

Previous collaboration
The demo builds upon a number of mobility-related achievements by the two companies over the past several years. In February, they demonstrated 5G handover capability in an urban city environment at speeds of up to 60km/h on public roads.

Samsung said in a statement one of the most exciting prospects for 5G technology is the potential for new and highly specialised service scenarios which go beyond traditional smart device connectivity.

“5G’s ability to deliver on this promise is directly tied to its ability to meet the unique performance needs of a wide number of increasingly-connected industries, from smart city IoT to connected cars and more.”

Last week KDDI rival SoftBank partnered with Chinese vendor Huawei to demonstrate potential 5G use cases for its enterprise partners, as part of the operator’s push to launch the technology in 2020.