Gogo Plans to Launch 5G Air-To-Ground Network in 2021
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Just over a year after announcing it was working with the founding members of the Seamless Air Alliance, including its customer Delta Air Lines, to develop “future generations of in-flight connectivity,” Gogo has revealed it is on the way to launching a 5G air-to-ground network.
Gogo has revealed plans to launch a new 5G air-to-ground (ATG) network in 2021 for use on commercial regional jets, small mainline jets and business aviation aircraft operating within the contiguous US and Canada.
Oakleigh Thorne, CEO of Gogo, commented, “We expect to launch Gogo 5G at the same time as the terrestrial telecommunications companies are deploying the same generation of technology on the ground – a first in the in-flight connectivity industry.”
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According to Gogo, the 5G network will be built on the company’s existing ATG infrastructure of more than 250 towers. Using unlicensed spectrum in the 2.4GHz range, the solution will support all spectrum types (licensed, shared and unlicensed) and bands (mid, high and low) with the support of a proprietary modem and advanced beamforming technology.
“Gogo 5G is the next step in our technology evolution and is expected to deliver an unparalleled user experience, pairing high performance with low latency and network-wide redundancy,” Thorne continued.
“Gogo 5G is the next step in our technology evolution and is expected to deliver an unparalleled user experience.” – Oakleigh Thorne, Gogo
However, Gogo will continue to employ its 3G and 4G networks throughout the continental US and in Canada to provide backup to the 5G network when needed.
The company has said it is committed to providing easy upgrade paths for current Gogo ATG customers to the new 5G network, and that once the new network is up and running, Gogo will be able to take advantage of new advances in technology as they come online.
In March, Gogo announced that it is moving its entire infrastructure to the cloud as part of a new partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS). By using Amazon Simple Storage Service for storing and analyzing in-flight data, Gogo hopes to to identify and address pain points and drive higher customer adoption of internet and entertainment services in-flight.