OnePlus Set to Bring 5G Smartphone to Europe with UK's EE

OnePlus CEO Pete Lau has announced that its next flagship will be powered by the Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 855 Mobile Platform at the Qualcomm Snapdragon Technology Summit 2018.

OnePlus is scheduled to be among the first smartphone companies to power its new flagship with this new premium-tier mobile platform to provide customers with unmatched speed, performance, and intelligence for the new decade of wireless experience.

Pete Lau also announced at the event that OnePlus will be the first to release a commercial 5G smartphone with carrier network EE in UK in 2019. EE is the UK’s number one mobile network, and was named as the UK’s best network for the 5th year in a row by RootMetrics.

Since its establishment five years ago, OnePlus has only made flagship smartphones powered by the Snapdragon 8 Series Mobile Platforms. OnePlus recently launched its latest flagship device—the OnePlus 6T, powered by the Snapdragon 845. The company also partners with T-Mobile to sell OnePlus 6T across 5600 T-Mobile offline stores around the United States.

“We are proud to work with OnePlus to continue to bring breakthrough mobile experiences to consumers,” said Alex Katouzian, senior vice president and general manager, mobile, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “Snapdragon 855 is designed to deliver multi-gigabit 5G, industry leading AI and immersive extended reality (XR) ushering in a new decade of wireless experiences to come.”

OnePlus is well-known for its flagship products and received strong support from its global community through word-of-mouth marketing. The OnePlus community has amassed over 5 million users, most of which are tech enthusiasts from over 196 countries and regions around the world.

OnePlus has also been collaborating with Qualcomm Technologies on 5G development since 2017. In October 2018, OnePlus achieved another breakthrough in 5G research, by releasing the first 5G tweet. Together, they have made significant strides in designing a device ready for 5G integration and commercialization in 2019.

Pete Lau said at the event, “OnePlus only makes flagship smartphones, and we believe that the Snapdragon 855 is the best and only choice. We are thrilled by its powerful performance and 5G capabilities. OnePlus will continue to bring its users the best technology and the best user experience possible.”

OnePlus is a global mobile technology company challenging conventional concepts of technology. Created around the “Never Settle” mantra, OnePlus creates exquisitely designed devices with premium build quality and high-performance hardware. OnePlus thrives on cultivating strong bonds and growing together with its community of users and fans.

Marc Allera, CEO of BT’s Consumer division, said: “EE and OnePlus have a shared vision: to give our customers the best connected experience possible. We’re working together on cutting edge technology to deliver that, and we’re leading the world on the journey to 5G. Adding 5G to the UK’s number one 4G network will increase reliability, increase speeds, and keep our customers connected where they need it most. We have an ambition to connect our customers to 4G, 5G or Wi-Fi 100% of the time.”

EE is switching on 5G sites in 16 UK cities in 2019. The first launch cities will be the UK’s four capital cities – London, Cardiff, Edinburgh and Belfast – and Birmingham and Manchester.

As well as the six launch cities, through 2019 EE will also be introducing 5G across the busiest parts of ten more UK cities: Glasgow, Newcastle, Liverpool, Leeds, Hull, Sheffield, Nottingham, Leicester, Coventry and Bristol.

EE is upgrading to 5G where it can make the biggest difference to the most people.

The first 1,500 sites that EE is upgrading to 5G in 2019 carry 25% of all data across the whole network today, but only cover 15% of the UK population. 5G is built on top of EE’s award winning 4G network – customers’ 5G experience will be dictated by the quality of both 4G and 5G, as well as the underlying fixed network.

EE is upgrading transmission to 10Gbps links at each 5G site, and has tested the new links – the fastest in use anywhere in the UK – at its trial sites in Canary Wharf and across East London.

Ongoing 4G Investment

EE is still upgrading 4G sites as part of its overall network strategy, while turning 3G signal into 4G to enable more spectrum for a better network experience. The busiest sites will have five carriers of 4G spectrum supporting the new 5G spectrum, making them the highest speed sites of any UK operator in 2019.

As well as increasing capacity, EE is expanding 4G coverage into rural parts of the UK to give rural communities the coverage and capacity that they need. EE has built more than 350 brand new sites in 2018 alone.

Best Network – Five Years in a Row

In August, EE was named as the UK’s best network for the 5th year in a row. RootMetrics travelled 20,928 miles, and undertook 593,008 tests (including calls, data and text messages), of all four of the UK networks across England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, in the first six months of 2018. The company has been testing all UK mobile operators every six months since 2012.

EE is currently trialling live 5G in Canary Wharf, and parts of East London. New devices and functionality are being tested in the state-of-the-art Borehamwood test lab.