Telstra Corp. Ltd. partnered with Ericsson AB, Qualcomm Inc. and Netgear Inc. to launch the first commercial Gigabit LTE network in Sydney and other select locations in Australia, according to a Jan. 30 announcement.

The new network, considered a key step toward 5G, increases the Australian telco's uplink speeds to twice that of its previous capability.

According to a Feb. 1 report by The Australian Financial Review, the network also demonstrated the ability to download data up to 10 times faster than the maximum speed available on the NBN (National Broadband Network).

Netgear's Nighthawk M1 router for use with the Gigabit LTE network will become available in late February.