By Claus Hetting, Wi-Fi NOW CEO & Chairman
Breaking news: Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT announced yesterday the formal release of the full 6 GHz band to Wi-Fi. With this ruling the Republic of Korea becomes the first Asian country to adopt 6 GHz Wi-Fi and only the third country in the world to release the band following the US and the United Kingdom.
Yesterday, South Korea – a nation of more than 51 million pop – became only the third country in the world to free the 6 GHz band to Wi-Fi and the first country in Asia to do so. The decision was announced on the website of Korea’s Ministry of Science and ICT here.
Not all the regulatory details of the spectrum release are clear but the good news is that Korea has – similar to the FCC – decided to release the entire 1.2 GHz of band (5,925 MHz – 7,125 MHz) to unlicensed use. Korea is only the second country to do so (the UK has for now only released the lower 500 MHz portion of the spectrum). The regulatory notice also confirms that up to seven new 160 MHz Wi-Fi bands will be made available within the new band. The Ministry says it has tested the new technology and results show a throughput of 2.1 Gbps as well as 2 ms of latency.
The Korean government has completed the regulatory process for 6 GHz Wi-Fi in record time: The first regulatory notice indicating that the band was under consideration for delicensing came in July of this year. Korea is one of the world’s most highly advanced high-tech and ICT economies and home to phone and electronics giants Samsung and LG, among others.
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Other nations on track towards 6 GHz Wi-Fi including Brazil and Europe (CEPT countries) while some initial indications have recently emerged that a regulatory process may be underway in Mexico and Colombia. Brazilian regulator ANATEL spoke on Day 7 of the Virtual Wi-Fi World Congress 2020 conducted by Wi-Fi NOW only last week. A special event on 6 GHz Wi-Fi for India was conducted by Wi-Fi NOW in September and is still available for viewing here.
/Claus.
