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Huawei, China’s mobile carriers bring 5G communications to Mount Everest

  • This marks the latest mobile network upgrade on Mount Everest, where Chinese carriers had previously installed 2G, 3G and 4G equipment
  • China Mobile plans to deploy Huawei 5G gear at an altitude of 6,500 metres, providing network coverage to the mountain’s summit

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A team from China Mobile shows off the initial 5G base stations, supplied by Huawei Technologies, that the telecoms carrier deployed on Mount Everest this April. Photo: Weibo
Jane Zhang
Huawei Technologies has teamed up with wireless network operators China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom to roll out advanced 5G infrastructure on Mount Everest, the world’s highest mountain above sea level.

The deployment of 5G base stations on the famous Himalayan mountain, with an elevation of 8,848 metres, has extended the reach of the next-generation mobile technology, which has been held up as “the connective tissue” for the Internet of Things, autonomous cars, smart cities and other new applications – providing the backbone for the industrial internet. The new 5G infrastructure roll-outs were announced by Huawei in a post on Chinese microblogging site Weibo on Monday and confirmed by its spokeswoman on Tuesday.

China Mobile, the world’s largest wireless network operator, said its 5G project on Mount Everest marked “not only another extreme challenge in a human life exclusion zone, but also laid a solid foundation for the later development of 5G smart tourism and 5G communications for scientific research”, according to the company’s post on Weibo on Monday.

The Hong Kong and New York-listed carrier set up three 5G base stations – radio access gear that connects mobile devices to the broader telecommunications network – on April 19 in two camps at altitudes of 5,300 metres and 5,800 metres, which provide online download speed of about 1 gigabit per second.

China Mobile plans to install two more 5G base stations, supplied by telecommunications gear maker Huawei Technologies, on Mount Everest before April 25. Photo: Weibo
China Mobile plans to install two more 5G base stations, supplied by telecommunications gear maker Huawei Technologies, on Mount Everest before April 25. Photo: Weibo

Installation of two more base stations are expected to be completed by China Mobile before April 25 in another camp at an altitude of 6,500 metres, providing 5G network coverage to the summit of Mount Everest. The international border between China and Nepal is 1,414 kilometres in length and runs across that summit.

More than 150 China Mobile employees are taking part on the construction and maintenance of the new 5G base stations as well as upgrading existing infrastructure on the surrounding areas, according to the company. It said 25 kms of new optical cables have also been laid out to support this project.

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