This is the first deployment of Nokia’s Airscale-powered 4.5G solution within the Ooredoo group, and one of the first operators globally to launch the service.
Ooredoo Qatar said it will deploy the technology to meet data demands in Doha, and The Pearl-Qatar, an artificial island within the city.
It is part of Ooredoo’s ongoing network upgrades, which feature in its roadmap to launch Gigabit data speeds later this year after it acquires additional spectrum.
Waleed Al-Sayed, chief executive officer of Ooredoo Qatar, said: "We are committed to providing our customers with the best possible data experience by deploying the latest and best technology on the Ooredoo Supernet.
“Data traffic continues to grow across our network and working with Nokia we can leverage the higher speeds enabled by 4.5G Pro now - and further boost speeds in the future with 4.9G when it becomes commercially available - to satisfy these demands."
Nokia’s solution leverages two component carrier aggregation with 4x4 MIMO antenna technology ad 256 QAM to offer speeds of up to 800Mbps.
At the recent Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona, Nokia demonstrated what it called “4.9G” hitting data speeds of up to 3Gbps, with plans to launch the technology later this year
Bernard Najm, head of the Middle East market unit at Nokia, said: "We are delighted to continue our long history of collaborating with Ooredoo on this deployment. We are showing how our customers can use our technology to deliver performance boosts in the most demanding areas as they evolve their networks on the path to 5G."
