October 14th, 2011
Critics often chide the United States for “lagging” in some measure of communications adoption. At various times in the past, that criticism has extended to use of mobile phones, text messaging, residential broadband and advanced mobile applications.
But U.S. consumers have shown an ability to adopt such innovations in relatively short order once the value was perceived. Nobody argues anymore that U.S. consumers somehow lag in use of any of those services.
More recently, the U.S. market has emerged as the leader in mobile applications, smart phone development and now will take leadership in 4G networks as well.
Verizon, MetroPCS, and AT&T will account for the majority of 4G Long Term Evolution connections globally by year-end 2011. Pyramid Research expects that U.S. mobile service providers, with seven million LTE connections, will account for 47 percent of the world’s LTE subscriptions.
LTE forecast
Pyramid expects 71 percent of 5.4 million global LTE handset sales will come from the United States in the near term. Separately, Informa Telecoms & Media projects something on the order of 600 million 4G subscriptions in service by about 2016.
The strong demand for mobile broadband in the U.S. market also will allow operators to quickly recoup spending on capital investments. Verizon and NTT Docomo, both the largest operators in their respective countries, each launched LTE in December 2010.
US leads in LTE
Tags: 4g, lte
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October 10th, 2011
To say there is a bit of instability in much of the U.S. mobile backhaul market would be an understatement. After announcing it would buy about $20 billion worth of Apple iPhones, whether it can sell them or not, Sprint announced that it would expedite the building of its new Long Term Evolution network this summer, with completion by the end of 2013, a breath-taking time table. $20 billion worth of iPhones
Sprint also said it would no longer sell WiMAX devices after 2012, a clear indication Sprint intends to wean its customers off the Clearwire network. Clearwire and Sprint equities both tanked on the news.
Sprint executives say LTE devices would be available for its network in the summer of 2012. Sprint LTE plans
Clearwire insisted it wasn’t dead, and remains essential to Sprint’s 4G plans. Investors clearly aren’t so sure. But with LightSquared still facing serious objections to its own LTE launch plans, that means three national networks now face a bit of uncertainty about how much capacity they will be needing, and perhaps none of the three companies can provide complete assurance of financial success in the future, as independent entities.
Nor, for that matter, can any of the three completely shake concerns about bankruptcy. Three national networks that might not exist in the future is quite a lot of potential backhaul business that could evaporate.
Of course, Dish Network also says it wants to build a national LTE network, so add a fourth element to the dynamic situation.
Tags: backhaul, Clearwire, Lightsquared, Sprint
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October 7th, 2011
Sprint executives say the firm will launch Long Term Evolution services on the Sprint network, using the 1900 MHz spectrum, aggressively in 2012, with an expected full coverage of the United States by the end of 2013.
If the implications of that move are not clear, it means Sprint has decided to start using the LTE air interface in the same spectrum it presently uses to support its 3G CDMA network.
That means a complete upgrade to LTE across the entire Sprint footprint, cannibalizing CDMA spectrum. Some had thought Sprint would use the 800-MHz spectrum freed up by the shut down of the iDEN network, or perhaps spectrum made available by Clearwire. It appears Sprint simply has decided it cannot wait, and is going to start pulling 3G spectrum off line as it adds LTE services in the same frequencies.
Sprint executives expect that by the end of 2013, 275 million potential users (PoPs) will be covered by the LTE network, including 100 percent of the area where Sprint’s 4G WiMAX services now exist.
The move is highly significant, as it means Sprint is going to move fairly quickly to upgrade CDMA users to LTE.
Sprint to use CDMA bands for LTE
Tags: 3g, 4g, lte, Sprint
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