SK Telecom (SKT), the largest mobile operator in South Korea, achieved a peak data speed of 1Gb/s using Ericsson’s licensed assisted access (LAA) platform in indoor tests.

The operator used one LTE 20MHz band and three Wi-Fi 20MHz bands, and applied Ericsson’s 4×4 MIMO functionality in the LTE frequency.

LAA uses licensed LTE spectrum and unlicensed spectrum.

Listen-before-talk (LBT) technology also was applied to both the Wi-Fi and LTE networks to maximise the use of the available spectrum and reduce resource contention, Ericsson said in a statement.

Park Jin-hyo, SKT’s head of network R&D, said: “The technology we have tested is the starting point for an evolution to 5G.”

Using Ericsson’s LAA solution means broadband users connected to Wi-Fi automatically take advantage of inherent LTE benefits, said Patrick Johansson, CEO at Ericsson-LG, a joint venture between Ericsson and LG Electronics.

Ericsson explained in its statement: “In short, they are able to access the network more quickly and when terminating a session, network resources are also released more quickly. This improves the utilisation of the unlicensed spectrum and more important, the overall experience for all users.”