It remains a very distinct possibility that Sprint will make the jump to LTE. Sprint issued an RFP exploring the migration to LTE, then announced a multi-billion dollar network overhaul that could easily pave the way for such transition. We’ve also heard it from more than one employee over the last six months that Sprint absolutely will be building an LTE Network despite executive protestations. No this should come to no surprise as we here at PPCGeeks reported the network overhaul and the fact that Clearwire has been doing LTE testing and has shown speeds of 90 mb/s burst. Of course this news was before the leaked news that Clearwire will be going wholesale, though Clearwire too has made hints they could shift to LTE – for survival reasons. Whatever the outcome, Sprint may say they’ll be making their intention clean sometime over the next 4 to 6 month time frame.
“Our 4G strategy is WiMAX, full stop!” – Dan Hesse, November 2010.
Over the next 4 to 6 months Spring Nextel (NYSE:S) will study and evaluate the rate which its customers migrate from the EV-DO to mobile WiMAX and calculate the best way to use its existing spectrum before it decides whether or not to deploy LTE. Sprint currently runs an EV-DO network in the 1900 MHz PCS band, and has a wholesale deal with Clearwire to use WiMAX in the 2.5 GHz band. Sprint also runs the iDEN network in the 800 MHz range, and we all know Sprint has said that it will begin to phase out the iDEN network in 2013.
It’s interesting that we went from Dan Hesse insistent that WiMAX was absolutely Sprint’s path in November, to a Sprint executive telling us they’re seriously considering the LTE shift just three months later.
Hmmmm could Verizon/AT&T LTE/voLTE be scarring big yellow into rethinking it’s plan? Tell us in the comments below Geeks, what is it that is making Sprint look into LTE, and what do you think it means for us SPrint users that have EVo, Epics and Evo Shifts? What is the future of Sprint? Let your comments be heard.
Source: DSLreports.com
© 2011, JasonFieldz. All rights reserved.
Well Dan DID hint that LTE was a future option. Im hoping that the crIossover from 4G to LTE is somewhat seamless (it wont be though). What are they goin got do with all of the 4G phones? Are they going to be compatible with LTE? Are they ALREADY compatible with LTE and something as simple as a software/firmware update can ‘activate’ the cabilities? I guess we will find out in 4-6 months…
Well, I hope that by that time (if it’s implemented) most of us will be ready for an upgrade. I would also hope that Sprint takes us in consideration and allow us to upgrade early if the move renders our current 4g phones useless.
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Look I’m not a sprint fan, Their coverage in my area is the worst, anyone I personally know who has them, hates them. No offience to all the Sprintboys here…
This is great news though. If everyone in the US goes to a single standard, it could be mobile harmony someday. No more battles of phones coming to the US that are GSM only, it will be LTE and work on any network. No more claims this one has the best network, you just hit send and the call goes through, who ever your with.
Then again, I also dream there are unicorns and that I have a money tree in my back yard that only grows $100 bills…. Yep, a dream
Sprint has already said that the current wimax towers are lte compatible. All they need is a software upgrade and some adjustments. Plus the current wimax towers that will be converted to lte will still be compatible with wimax. So for those who end up keeping their wimax/4g evo or epic or shift you will still have 4g even if they choose to go the lte route. Its just new phones that come after that wont be wimax but lte.Sprint since the beginning has said their wimax towers were upgradeable to lte. Its just a matter of them announcing if and when it was going to happen.
Sprint sucks.
@savior02
Don’t be mad that you pay twice as much for the same service on some other network. If you don’t like sprint thats your choice. Who cares. Don’t be mad that sprint was first with 4g and now is also going to be the only company compatible with 2 4g technologies.
Ericsson is pushing LTE since sprint’s infrastructure is a mess and a possible merger with T-mobile.