NTT builds municipal private wireless network for City of Las Vegas

NTT is building a private wireless network for the City of Las Vegas, Nevada. The new 5G network will be the most extensive private wireless network in the US. The City of Las Vegas intends for the network to serve as an open platform available to local businesses, government, and educational institutions. Shahid Ahmed, Group EVP of New Ventures and Innovation at NTT, said the network is currently in the testing stages and will be launched “in the next few weeks.” He specified that it’s not a direct-to-consumer service. The network is being tested with various organizations for different use cases such as remote learning and smart-city applications such as traffic-monitoring cameras. Unlike many Citizens Broadband Radio Service (CBRS) deployments, which are in-building or industrial, this network extends across public spaces. It’s also the first network of its size to be open to third-party APs and end-user devices. The private wireless network will cover the whole city. Devices that are compatible with the network will include a SIM, which will allow them to roam to macro networks if the user goes out of coverage from the private network.