Mohammad-Javad Azari Jahromi, Iran’s telecoms minister, has announced that he asked the national mobile operator MCI to roll out a 5G broadband connection in the country’s capital, Tehran.
He said that the next generation of mobile broadband Internet will become available in at least five locations in Tehran by the end of August or in early September.
Jahromi also tweeted that a laboratory for testing the 5G network will be unveiled in two weeks.
The Iranian government announced in February that it had finalised the preparations for 5G roll-out, including regulations, and aims to begin it in the Persian calendar year starting in late March.
Government statistics show that nearly 70 million of 82 million Iranians have access to broadband services offered by three mobile operators. That compares with just 300,000 in 2013, according to Jahromi.
His announcement came during the inauguration of a large data centre in the north-western city of Tabriz by MCI, the country’s first and largest operator. The 250-rack facility is said to be Iran’s second-largest after a 407-rack centre built by another major operator, MTN Irancell, in Tehran in May.
