Claro Brasil de América Móvil reports more than 2.5 million 5G-compatible smartphones operating on its network and 70% of the devices it currently sells are enabled for the 5G spectrum bands licensed in Brazil.
“Claro is the leader in connected 5G devices, according to data from the latest survey of [la entidad reguladora] Anatel. Currently, 70% of the devices sold by Claro are compatible with 5G+. Furthermore, having taken the lead in offering 5G DSS, the operator already has around 2.6 million compatible smartphones operating on its network,” the telecommunications company said in a statement about the service launch in São Paulo.
5G+ is Claro’s trademark for 5G in dedicated spectrum.
Claro announced that it will launch 5G in the 3.5 GHz band in 52 neighborhoods of the largest city in Brazil after telecommunications operators were authorized to enable the signal in the band in the city of São Paulo starting this Thursday.
The telecommunications company said it is “encouraging” providers to ship more affordable devices to democratize and accelerate the adoption of new technology among end consumers.
Claro added that it has around 50 devices with 5G+ access in its portfolio and that its users can buy smartphones from 1,299 reais (US$246) through a postpaid plan with long-term financing options.
In the city of São Paulo, Claro is using the 3.5GHz and 2.3GHz bands after being the largest buyer of these frequencies in Anatel’s 5G tender last year.
Use of the service will not require any contract changes and any customer with a compatible device within an area covered by the technology will be able to access it without having to migrate plans or replace the SIM card, according to the company.
Claro estimates that its network can reach speeds between 600Mbps and 800Mbps, and eventually reach 1Gbps, depending on the size of the cell and the number of terminals connected at the same time.
One of the bets for São Paulo, the country’s main economic hub, are applications for the industrial and corporate sectors through Embratel, the Brazilian subsidiary of América Móvil for the B2B segment.
Embratel and Claro are evaluating implementing 5G together with artificial intelligence, IoT, cloud computing, big dataedge computing and machine learning for the health, manufacturing, education and agribusiness segments, among others.
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