Sprint Celebrates Coverage Milestones

December 18, 2014

December 18, 2014 — Sprint has expanded its LTE service in 552 markets to cover more than 260 million people, mostly with 1.9 GHz spectrum, John Saw, Sprint CTO, said in a blog post yesterday. The carrier has also expanded 2.5 GHz coverage in 16 new markets including Charlotte, North Carolina, and Indianapolis, Indiana, bringing it to a total of 62 markets covering more than 100 million people.

Saw

“We started out 2014 with clear priorities: finish the rip and replacement of the 3G Network Vision deployment; roll out HD Voice nationwide by July 2014; expand our LTE footprint at 1.9 GHz, 800 MHz and 2.5 GHz; and reach 100 million people with 2.5 GHz LTE by the end of the year. The network team here at Sprint is excited to close out the year and jump into 2015 having met, and in some cases exceeded, these important milestones,” Saw wrote.

Additionally, Sprint made progress toward its goal of covering rural communities. Sprint’s Rural Roaming Preferred Provider program now includes 27 carriers, with plans to extend LTE coverage in 27 states, covering 565,000 square miles and a population of more than 38 million.

In the year ahead, Sprint will continue to expand its 2.5 GHz LTE coverage in areas where it has the highest capacity demands, as well as continuing the 800 MHz build in areas that need indoor penetration.

“Today we’re halfway there [with the 800 MHz build], and we expect to be substantially complete with our LTE 800 MHz build by the end of 2015 in markets where the spectrum is available,” Saw wrote.

Verizon Wireless Makes Strides with Carrier Aggregation

Verizon Wireless announced today that it has launched XLTE in 10 new markets, bringing the number of markets to more than 400 markets or four out of five of its markets. XLTE is Verizon’s brand for LTE Advanced technology, which uses carrier aggregation to improve capacity and data speed.