SK Telecom (SKT), South Korea’s largest operator, by subscribers, has done what it claims is the world’s first commercialization of Uplink Cooperative Multi-Point (Uplink CoMP), which can possibly increase LTE upload speeds significantly, TeleGeography reports.

SKT explains that, thanks to its technology development partnership with Finland’s Nokia Solutions and Networks (NSN), in an area covered by many base stations, Uplink CoMP ensures that signals from mobile devices are received by more than one cell tower, before combining them for greater signal strength. The operator says that, once the technology was applied to test areas, it saw mobile data uploads up by an average of 20 percent within the coverage area. It now wants to introduce Uplink CoMP to all its LTE-enabled base stations by the end of this year.