A total of 15 companies have now joined the long term evolution (LTE) using unlicensed spectrum service provider MulteFire Alliance ever since it was formed by Nokia and Qualcomm at the end of last year.

Two Chinese companies are part of this alliance, including Beijing-headquartered Baicells Technologies Co Ltd and Internet of things company Neul which was acquired by Shenzhen-based Huawei Technologies two years ago.

Industry leaders such as Cisco, Ericsson, Intel, Softbank and Boingo have all joined the alliance.

Using unlicensed spectrum, particularly the 5 GHz band, MulteFire can easily be deployed by small businesses, enterprises, venue owners, Internet Service providers, cable companies, building owners and mobile operators.

It is especially suitable for densely populated areas like exhibition halls or scenarios which require better connectivity services such as mining areas.

Based on 3GPP technologies, MulteFire will be able to provide end-to-end quality of service and seamless connection. According to Ashish K. Dayama, senior marketing manager of the mobile broadband business unit of Nokia, LTE technology cannot be easily breached, while its capacity is twice that of other technologies, which make it the most suitable for the development of LTE.

There have been expressions of interest in MulteFire during the Mobile World Congress Shanghai 2016, said Dayama, adding that tests of this service are likely to be run by their vendors in China.