October 3: Nepal Telecom has expanded 4G service in more than 50 cities of 32 district on Wednesday, October 2.

Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli officially launched the high-speed mobile internet service through a video conference with chief ministers of all seven provinces.

Nepal Telecom said that its 4G service is now available in all major cities across the country.

The state-owned Nepal Telecom has started the 4G service for the first time on January 1, 2017. Initially introduced in Kathmandu and Pokhara, the service has now been expanded to 32 districts.

According to data maintained by Nepal Telecom, it has around 818,000 4G users.

The 4G service was expanded at a cost of Rs 19 billion. Nepal Telecom had awarded the contract to expand the service across the country to two Chinese companies last year. Among them, CCSI was responsible for radio access network expansion while JTE Corporation was involved in core network expansion, according to Nepal Telecom officials.

The radio access network connects the device of the users with the main tower of the service provider while the core network coordinates the network of the service provider.

Nepal Telecom’s Managing Director Dilli Ram Adhikari said that they were able to provide the 4G service within nine months after signing the agreement with the Chinese companies.

“We were planning to expand the 4G service in 20 cities but we managed to expand the service in 50 cities. This is a proud moment for us,” said Adhikari.

Nepal Telecom will provide 4G service from 800 Megahertz band in 50 cities.