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Dubai: The UAE’s etisalat is in talks with iPhone manufacturer Apple Inc on the possible launch of the iPhone 5 as its rolls its fourth-generation mobile broadband Long Term Evolution (LTE) later this year, its spokesperson said.

etisalat’s (a carrier in Dubai) Chief Corporate Communication Officer, Ali Al Ahmad, says is true. He was quoted as saying: “Yes, we are in talks with most smartphone manufacturers including Apple on the rollout of the 4G handset, iPhone 5 later this year. As the first telecom organization to roll out the 4G network, LTE, in the Middle East, we have already started talking to them for the handsets and chipsets in them.”

Etisalat is in the final stage of trials on the advanced LTE network, in order to commercially launch the service in the third quarter of this year. It is scheduled to start distributing the communication devices to make the system ready for up to 150 mbps (megabytes per second) download speed, that will change the way people communicate. The full implementation could take months.

LTE is one of the latest innovations in mobile broadband technologies in the world, with a peak downloading speed of up to 150mbps.

Du, the UAE’s second telecom operator, is also gearing up for the 4G network, said an official of Huawei, the Chinese telecom solutions provider.

“Both etisalat and du are getting ready for the 4G LTE network, although I think etisalat will be slightly ahead in the rollout,” Mohammad Atif Jameel, Huawei’s Senior Wireless Solutions Manager, told Gulf News on the sidelines of a seminar yesterday. Ali Al Ahmad said the first phase of the LTE rollout will cover all key Emirates in the UAE through 800 base stations.

Regardless of the validity of the statement, I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Six more months until the end of the year, who knows what Apple has left in store for us!

News From gulfnews.com, ubergizmo.com
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