British Telecom (BT) has announced plans to offer 5G network slicing before the end of this summer with a partnership to provide connectivity for the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) Euro 2028 tournament in the United Kingdom (UK).
Report has it that BT is ready to go live with network slicing came during an event at Wembley Stadium after the operator announced that it is the official telecommunications partner for the UEFA Euro 2028 championship in the UK, which is co-hosting the tournament with Ireland.
Speaking on the sidelines of the event, BT chief security and networks officer, Greg McCall said the carrier had been working on network slicing for many years “to prove the technology and make sure that we can put our name and brand behind it, and we feel that we are now ready to do that.”
Network slicing is a feature in 5G standalone (SA) networks (which BT calls 5G+) that carves out a priority lane for better performance for specific applications that could be offered to businesses or consumers for a premium. Since the rollout of 5G SA is well behind expectations generally around the world, network slicing has also been slow to take off.
BT’s 5G SA network now covers 50 million people in the UK and will reach more than 60 million by the time of Euro 2028, according to McCall. The carrier has a target for 99 percent population coverage for 5G SA by 2030.
He explained that BT does not claim to have 5G SA coverage in a town or city until it can reach 90 percent of the population to prevent “irregular service” experience for customers. “[With 5G+], we’ve got enough breadth across the country that we feel now is the time for us to do some national slicing,” he said.
“National” means that it will be available across the country wherever there is 5G SA, but the carrier is not ready to share what kinds of slices it will offer. As broad examples, the use cases will be ones that require extra resilience and low latency.
“Applications that are more susceptible to jitter, we can give them that resilient, dependable connection that isn’t interrupted when lots of other people join the network,” said McCall.
He also said the slicing offers would be available to consumers as well as business customers, “because we feel there is a need and desire for customers to get that differentiated, prioritized service across our network.”
Though the modus charge for the service was not disclosed, McCall said there was a high appetite to pay for such services for broadcast and other business use cases.
BT has provided network slices for various use cases, including for broadcasters and photographers, at football matches at Wembley Stadium (where BT’s mobile arm EE is the connectivity provider).
