Hong Kong's Communications Authority has launched a public consultation covering proposed use of the 5-GHz shared spectrum band for the provision of licensed assisted access (LAA) LTE mobile services.
The CA has currently allocated 580 MHz of spectrum in the 5-GHz shared band for the provision of public Wi-Fi and other local area network services as well as qualifying Wi-Fi enabled services.
The authority is consulting on the possibility of implementing LAA, LTE Wi-Fi Aggregation, MulteFire and other technologies enabling the use of shared spectrum in LTE networks is an unprotected and uncoordinated manner.
According to the CA, if these technologies were implemented in Hong Kong it would significantly enhance the spectrum capacity provided by the total of 552 MHz of licensed mobile spectrum currently assigned to mobile operators, improving service quality for end-users.
Members of the industry and the public have been invited to submit their views on the proposal during the consultation period, which will run until March 1.
The accompanying discussion paper notes that Hong Kong's mobile penetration has grown to 247% as of October, with the average citizen consuming around 4GB of mobile data per month.
It reveals that one mobile operator has completed a technical trial of the use of 5-GHz spectrum for LAA and another is conducting a trial due to be completed in 1H18, and that one operator has applied to use LAA in the 5-GHz band for the provision of public mobile services.