At the time when the whole world is talking about Samsung's new 5G Internet speed achievement, researchers in Germany have quietly developed something that can beat Samsung's latest breakthrough with a 40 times faster Internet speed.

Researchers at Germany's Fraunhofer Institute for Applied Solid State Physics (IAF) and the Karlsruhe Institute for Technology (KIT) have successfully set up a Wi-Fi network that can produce a constant connection speed of 40 GB per second.

The connectivity range of the Wi-Fi spreads beyond .6 miles (1 km) with the same speed.

By achieving this Internet speed at the frequency of 240 GHz, the researchers have created a new world record.

The connection was set up with the help of fully integrated electronic transmitters and receivers that have been developed for a frequency of 240 GHz, which allows the transmission of data rates of up to 40 GB.

The Karlsruhe Institute of Technology installed a long range demonstrator between two skyscrapers to cover the distance of over a kilometer. The entire project is named as 'Millilink.'

"We have managed to develop a radio link based on active electronic circuits, which enables similarly high data rates as in fiber-optic systems, therefore allowing seamless integration of the radio link", said Prof. Ingmar Kallfass, who coordinated the project at Fraunhofer IAF within the scope of a Shared Professorship between IAF and KIT.

The operation Millilink is funded by Germany's Ministry of Education and Research and the project is aimed to bring radio links into broadband optical communication networks so rural areas can be provided with high-speed Internet networks.

This technology will also give an opportunity to Internet service providing companies to expand their reach in those areas where setting up wired networks is very expensive and difficult because of the topology and other geographic conditions of the areas.

If we go by the area covered and the speed of the Internet, it looks like big transmitters and receivers must have been used in the entire setup. However, since the size of electronic circuits and antenna scales with frequency, the transmitter and receiver chip only measures 4x1.5 mm².

The transmission and reception of data with frequency between 200 and 208 GHz is made possible by a semi-conductor technology developed by Frauhhofer IAF.

"This makes our radio link easier to install compared to free-space optical systems for data transmission. It also shows better robustness in poor weather conditions such as fog or rain," Jochen Antes of KIT said.