ZTE Corporation and MTN have announced the successful commercial rollout of the world’s first 5-band Remote Radio Unit (RRU) in South Africa’s Western Cape Province—a landmark achievement in global radio frequency technology. This breakthrough is set to accelerate Africa’s telecom evolution, balancing performance, sustainability, and efficiency.
South Africa, one of Africa’s most advanced telecom markets, already benefits from MTN’s LTE coverage that reaches over 97% of its population. Yet, growing demand for multi-band services has created challenges around power consumption, tower load, and limited infrastructure space. The 5-band RRU directly addresses these by integrating all MTN South Africa’s low and mid-frequency FDD bands into a single compact unit.
This integration reduces the number of RF modules by 50%, cuts equipment weight by 23%, and lowers wind resistance by 18%. Such optimizations streamline site construction, simplify deployments, and free up tower space.
Powered by ZTE’s proprietary chipset and Super-N amplifier architecture, the solution enables dynamic power efficiency. Compared to traditional Doherty systems, it reduces overall site power consumption by 42.7% and improves energy efficiency by 45.8% (Wh/GB). These gains support South Africa’s green, low-carbon development goals while setting a global benchmark for sustainable telecom infrastructure.
Rami Farah, CTO of MTN South Africa, highlighted the deployment as a new integrated solution that addresses coverage, capacity, cost, and sustainability challenges, creating a replicable model for Africa and beyond. Luca Shen, CEO of ZTE South Africa, emphasized the partnership’s role in advancing Africa’s digital transformation and positioning South Africa as a continental benchmark for telecom innovation.
Both ZTE and MTN reaffirmed their commitment to building smarter, energy-efficient networks that bridge the digital divide and contribute to Africa’s economic and social development.
