Singapore operator Singtel kicked-off trials on its new standalone (SA) 5G network for enterprises, with cloud gaming provider Ubitus the first to take advantage of the lower latency delivered using the 3.5GHz band and MIMO technology.

In a statement, the operator said the SA trial, the first in the city state, demonstrated a gaming experience which delivered 85 per cent lower latency of between 8ms and 11ms compared with cloud gaming on 4G. It was conducted on Singtel’s multi-access edge computing (MEC) platform, which integrates ultra-low latency and high bandwidth capabilities with cloud computing performance.

Ubitus CEO Wesley Kuo said: “We are very excited with the potential of Singtel’s SA 5G and MEC to push the envelope on cloud gaming.”

Bill Chang, CEO of group enterprise at Singtel, said the trial network offers enterprises from across industries the opportunity to develop and test applications to accelerate automation and digitalisation.

“The launch of this SA 5G trial network is also an important step as we get ready for commercial SA. We welcome enterprises to harness the power of 5G to future-proof their businesses and catalyse their digital transformation at 5G Garage.”

NSA deployments
The gaming trial follows the unveiling of a 5G-powered unmanned pop-up retail store, called Unboxed, and the launch of non-standalone (NSA) network trials for consumer and enterprise customers in early September.

Singtel said since it opened its 5G Garage with Ericsson and Singapore Polytechnic in January 2019, it developed ten 5G use cases together with more than 20 start-ups and enterprises in areas spanning robotics, VR, AI and drones.

The government awarded licences for two SA 5G networks in April, allocating 100MHz of 3.5GHz spectrum to the StarHub and M1 joint venture, and Singtel.

Rival M1 introduced commercial 5G service on an NSA network in limited parts of the city state in late September, while its 5G network partner StarHub started a trial service in August using the NSA architecture.