Can the fourth-generation, more commonly called the 4G mobile Internet really be beneficial to the UK floundering economy?

The fact is that smartphones and other mobile devices that are facilitated by the 3G Internet seem to be selling like hot cakes. Therefore it is apparent that not only the mobile operators but also, mobile phone makers, manufacturers of the related accessories, software developers and even the staff that they have on the rolls seem to symbolize a vital ecological network that can make millions. This they can do by instigating businesses and buyers to upgrade their present mobile phones to a technology that can offer faster speeds for mobile broadband connectivity.

Why then are the 4G services that can offer up to 5Mbits per second and a regular speed of between 30 and 50Mbits per second taking another three to four years to get to the UK? This is in spite of the fact that these services have already been provided in many parts of the European mainland and the US. In comparison the UK is yet to get over the trial stage where O2 have declared a London Trial for the Long Term Evolution (LTE) 4G wireless technology during the week. The trial will ensure the upgrade of the present 25 masts that cover a range of 15 square miles in Soho, The Canary Wharf, South Bank, King Cross and Westminster regions.

Rob Joyce, Head of O2's LTE informed Computing that the trial run will be conducted for a period of six months providing connections to people specially picked out. O2's objective is to determine whether the 100Mbps speeds are really accomplishable in thickly populated metropolitan areas, because it is believed that bandwidth can keep fluctuating depending on the number of Internet users accessing the Internet at the same time. This will also help them to determine their closeness to the transmission station.

He added that during their trial run in London would depend on a network system that would be provided by Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) that can provide up to 3,000 to a single cell at the same time. He stated that this trial was in no way similar to the trial run they carried out in Slough where they utilized 4G LTE gear from Huawei. Mr. Joyce also said that they had not been in a position to test it completely yet.

Since 4G mobile phones are in the market yet, their trial run would connect 4G dongles to laptops or other mobile devices that have USB ports. However this is not really an effective means of trying out a network that will finally transfer data from users of mobile phones who will be in different places and who will be using different applications. Nevertheless some sort of trial is better than no trial at all, was what was commented by Saverio Romeo who is the Senior Industry Analyst a Frost and Sullivan, a research company.

He stated that a trial carried out on netbooks or laptops will in no way offer too much information regarding the factors concerning mobility, however it is imperative that an operator should begin a trial run in a place where there are plenty of internet users, because that is what has to be confronted. The only issue here is whether there will be many people willing to take on this upgrade, all the more so because HTML traffic has been increased to ensure better working even when the speeds are slow.