Telstra on course to give mobile peak downlink speeds

The telco said on Tuesday its planned deployment of enhanced HSPA (eHSPA) to the Next G wireless network was on schedule, with connectivity testing between network infrastructure equipment and mobile device technology having been successfully completed.

Australians using the Telstra network will be the first in the world to experience peak download speeds of 21 mega bits per second (Mbps) by the end of the year, the company said in a statement.

"This is truly game-changing," Telstra Wireless executive director Mike Wright said.

"Telstra has a proven history of investment in Australia's nationwide, HSPA-enabled Next G network and this is our latest, very important step toward realising this technology," Wright said.

"Practically speaking, our tests have shown that when combined with our planned rollout of ethernet backhaul, this network will deliver truly high-speed connectivity on the move."

Telstra's Next G wireless network covers 99 per cent of the Australian population, the telco says.