Deutsche Telekom again slated German authorities regarding the process of deploying 5G, even as it began launching the technology in its home market.

In a statement today (3 July) announcing the availability of 5G services, Deutsche Telekom board member and Telekom Deutschland MD Dirk Wossner berated regulatory tardiness around deployments. The operator stated it needs “a clear regulatory framework and pragmatism from authorities, particularly when it comes to questions regarding regional spectrum, local roaming, allocation of the auction proceeds and the approval procedures, which takes far too long in Germany”.

Deutsche Telekom bid a total of €2.2 billion for four blocks of 5G spectrum in the 2GHz band and nine blocks in the 3.6GHz band in an auction which concluded in mid-June.

The country’s auction process netted €6.6 billion in total, a cost Deutsche Telekom blasted for causing a “significant setback” to 5G deployments and rival Vodafone Germany described as a “disaster”.

Deutsche Telekom appears to be putting the auction behind it: “We punched our ticket for a 5G future with the spectrum auction. Our goal now is to get 5G to the streets, to our customers, as quickly as possible”, Wossner (pictured, left) said today.

He added almost 75 per cent of the locations it is eyeing are already equipped with fibre.

Strategy
The operator has lit 5G antennas in Berlin and Bonn, with Darmstadt, Hamburg, Leipzig and Munich to swiftly follow as it moves to deploy a total of 300 antennas in 100 locations by the year-end. Over the next 18 months, Deutsche Telekom is targeting coverage in the country’s 20 largest cities, where it stated it sees the greatest potential benefit of the technology for consumers.

It also highlighted its work to build a thriving 5G ecosystem, noting 18 start-up companies are working at its Hubraum technology incubator facility, which offers them access to a pre-commercial network operating in Berlin.

Claudia Nemat, board member covering Technology and Innovation (pictured, right), said Deutsche Telekom had “learned a great deal about how 5G can be experienced” through its partnerships with start-ups, while also highlighting similar relationships with industrial partners.

Devices
The operator is offering Samsung’s Galaxy S10 5G for €899.95, with discounts and credits worth up to €300 available for device trade-ins and “early adopters”. The Magenta Mobil XL Special price plan costs €84.95 per month, with customers not yet in 5G range automatically reverting to its 4G LTE network.

HTC’s 5G Hub is also on offer, a portable hotspot delivering 1Gb/s data rates for up to 20 devices, priced €555.55 and running through the Magenta Mobil Speedbox XL plan, costing €74.95 per month.